Harald Haugaard

Lieve Boussauw Lieve onsider the map of Denmark for a That’s been a clear path for Haugaard, years I was playing, there were no borders moment. “We are almost completely although not at first a direct one. He began between classical music and folk music. It surrounded by water,” said fiddler and playing the violin as a child, taught by the was just music, to me. And in folk music, I C composer Harald Haugaard. “Really, local organist in Funen, where he grew up. “If started to earn money — I played for dances. we have been a harbor for all kinds of musical you take violin in Denmark, it’s hard to get In classical music you just learn to rehearse influences from all over northern Europe.” rid of classical music!” he said, laughing. “I all the time, and practice. But I used what was Out of that, over centuries the Danish people think it’s just a part you have to go through. inside me, stories I wanted to tell. It didn’t have created a folk music all their own, I wasn’t scared or afraid of classical music at matter to me what kind of music it was,” he reflecting their own landscape, character, and all, and I was brought up with normal violin said. He formed several bands and tried out interests. Taking the story of Danish music teaching and played classical music. different kinds of music, from hard rock to to the world, and building on and extending “At the same time, my grandfather was an Renaissance, and briefly spent time playing its traditions, are the things Haugaard has accordion player, and my mother was a dance other instruments, including drums and bass. chosen as his life’s work. caller. So for me, for the first five years or 10 He came back to the violin, though, and was Dirty Linen 37 that works for Haugaard, who both plays tradi- With Morten Alfred Høirup tional material and composes his own works drawing on the varied ideas of Danish folk tradition. “It’s very hard to generalize about this music,” he said, “and it always depends on who is asking the question; what is the back- ground of the person asking the question? “But I would describe Danish music as very light, but bittersweet. It has a sense of humor, and a sense of melancholy. It’s very lyric, very poetic. “The instrumental music in Danish music, as in many other countries, is dance music. We also have a huge vocals tradition as well, with hymns and ballads and songs, and there are a lot of sailing songs, sea songs, as we are almost completely surrounded by the sea,” he continued. “In the old days, it was much easier to travel on water than on land, so we have got a lot of influences from all over Europe — visual influences, and archi- tecture, and poetry, and music, and dance accepted into the prestigious Carl Nielsen make your choices in life, and that was one — so we are a harbor in northern Europe for Academy in a course of study to become a of the choices I had to make that was clear. traditional culture. When you look back, you music teacher. The course work focused on And later on at the Carl Nielsen Academy, we can see that we have German melodies and classical music. got the folk music bachelor’s and master’s polkas, and Scottish jigs and reels for inspira- “The older I got, and the more knowl- degree, and I was hired as a teacher there.” tion, but when you play a Danish jig or reel edge I got about it after studying two years He continued to teach at the Academy and it sounds different from a Scottish one, and a in classical music at the Academy, I saw that became head of the folk music department a Danish polska is different from a German it’s probably not my way to go, this classical until the time came when his touring schedule or Swedish one. way,” he said. “All my spare time I played became too demanding to mesh with his “You could say the music had been trav- folk music and was building up a career teaching duties. eling until this point, until it got to Denmark, already with bands playing folk music. So That touring included being part the and then it’s been changed and modified to my heart belonged to folk music, and I knew progressive Danish folk music band, Dug; the country and the landscape and the people that the money I was going to earn was in working with Sorten Muld, a techno folk who live here.” folk music, as well. So that was a clear choice group; Serras, a fusion-rock outfit; and school Haugaard has played his own part in for me.” concerts of traditional music with Lakkelej. those changes, both in how he plays music of A clear choice it might have been, but By far his best known and longest lasting the tradition and in the music he composes. “I the academic path wasn’t so clear. At that musical partnership to date, though, has been always have the idea that if you want to work time there was nowhere at the Carl Nielsen has been with the guitarist Morten Alfred with tradition, you have to consider tradition Academy, or in Denmark for that matter, Høirup as the duo Haugaard & Høirup. something that is alive, that is not dead at to study folk music at a university level. Together and individually, the pair have all. A tradition dies when you don’t renew Haugaard decided to see if he could make a won just about every category of the Danish it or give it some new influences. I think it’s change. “I went to the head of the Academy Music Awards [the Danish equivalent of the important to challenge tradition, in a very and said, ‘Could we do an experiment?’ Grammys]. The violinist and guitar player humble way, of course, and see what comes because there had never been folk music in first met in a one-off pairing put together by a of that,” he said. “Even though I am playing a Carl Nielsen Academy before. And he said conference organizer, and at the time neither tune from, let’s say, the 18th century, it’s very yes. He was ready for an experiment. So we was too thrilled. However, they soon found very important for me to play it like I want did it. they shared common interests in the past, to play it here at this moment, to update, to “I went to the old fiddlers and sat in present, and future of Danish folk music, make it alive nowadays. the kitchens with them, with coffee and a music they would take through Europe, “You have to do that in a humble way,” music, aquavit and music, and learned even Canada, the United States, and Japan in he explained. “I mean, I studied the tradi- more of the tradition that I knew from my more than a thousand concerts over a 10- tion and I know the tradition quite well, grandfather.” Some of the fiddlers Haugaard year span. but as soon as you have studied it and are has learned from include his grandfather, You’d figure it has to be pretty compelling, there, you can develop it and discover it and Johannes Kristensen; Hans Jørgen Chris- an instrumental music that can reach across explore it.” That is an approach he took into tensen; Poul Lendal; Peter Uhrbrand; and cultures and attract lasting fans around the account in one of his recent commissions, Hans Peter Solemark. He also studied with the world. But what exactly is Danish folk composing music and working as artistic classical violinists Børge Mortensen (from music? That’s a question, Haugaard said, that director for the opening concert at the world Denmark) and Alexander Fischer (from comes up often. The analogy of his country music expo WOMEX, which was held this Russia). as a harbor, holding influences from many autumn in Copenhagen. “It’s called Great “Asking to do that was a turning point currents of music and transforming them into Nordic Night,” he said, “and we took music in my career,” Haugaard said. “You have to something unique and ever-evolving, is one from all the Nordic traditions, using a lot 38 March/April ’10 #146 of traditional material but arranging it in a head, and then you write it down. I write in contemporary way.” my little book all the time! And then when Composing is one of the things Haugaard you really have to create, you have a basis, had in mind when he and Høirup decided to you have a lot of things to take from. And,” end their duo work. “He’s a great friend, and he added, “some days that goes very slowly it was fun, but we’d done it a lot,” Haugaard or doesn’t work at all, and other days, you’re said. He quickly filled up is time not only just flying.” with composing, but with working in a small He and Blum are planning on the airplane ensemble with his wife, folksinger Helene sort of flying, too, booking gigs with their trio, Blum. The two of them also put together a quartet, and big band at European summer sort of big band, with seven musicians, with festivals. “I’d really like to come back to the whom they are starting to tour.

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