‘A Double-Edged Sword’ – Spot On: Norwegian Music

Music from Norway is diverse like the country itself: sometimes raw, often introverted and always Idiosyncratic. Find an insight to what's going on up north right here.

28/01/2015
by Henrik Boerger

Illustration by Stefan Ibrahim

Imagine Norway like it is. The beauty of its seaside. Verdant valleys and its wooded hills. We here at the NOTHING BUT HOPE AND PASSION travel agency spared no effort to file research on this country and find out about local habits, customs and traditions. Like little monkeys we treated Norway’s indigenous citizens (and we love monkeys). Watched them, studied their behaviors. Put them under surveillance while they felt behaving under natural ambient conditions. A recent report on that was published here. But now, we need to take closer look (following similar coverage on Finland last year). Get away from superficial mannerisms and explore what the picturesque country in the north struggles about. Inside. What its fears and joys are and how their society is judged. Obviously, this can only be achieved by listening to a country’s musical output, by taking a closer look at young artists and how they express their state of mind.

But taking a look at a whole country’s music scene can be a quite fulfilling task. Population wise Norway is a comparably small country, a little more than 5 million citizens call it their home, but the scene’s diversity and output is pretty strong. This little anomaly forces the Norwegian music environment to structure itself a little differently compared to, let’s say, the British or German market. Where bigger countries can focus on internal affairs and may regard abroad activities as a second step, export is a stronger, more important term for the Norwegian music industry right from the start. Like that, especially festivals are an essential platform to provide anyone outside Norway with the latest hot chips of musical output. ØYA FESTIVAL is a prime example of how to put renowned international artist against a wave of new and upcoming ones from Scandinavia. The aforementioned Sørveiv festival at Kristiansand, the upcoming Trondheim Calling or By:Larm are smaller events that primarily focus on local scene and upcoming artists, to provide a diverse insight to what is happening right now in Norway and the Nordic countries for everyone from professionals to thirsty fans.

Music Norway is everywhere. Like here at the 2014 by:larm

To hear a profound and knowing voice to talk about what is going on and how it all works up north, we caught Jonas Vebner of Music Norway at one of the recent Ja Ja Ja Club Nights he and his team spread all over Europe. Read the interview first and find a diverse mix of ten uprising acts from Norway below.

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Could you explain the system of music-funding in Norway to us?
The Nordic countries have all a long tradition Governmental support of the arts and this is also the case for Norway and for its music sector. There are lots of different fundings available, both regional, national and international. They are usually motivated by economic, cultural (l’art pour l’art), social or regional factors or even as a tool for cultural diplomacy. I don’t think there is time to go into all of them. As Music Norway, we mainly concert ourselves with a trade-based approach to increase Norwegian music export. This motivation is based on a notion of supporting the sector as a creative industry and we work to facilitate increased exports out of Norway. This usually takes the form through financial schemes, programs to raise competence and networking amongst our own music industry as well as international marketing. This trade-based approach might not sound very sexy or romantic but at the end of the day its isn’t necessarily about creating global superstars that dominated Billboard but enabling performers, composers and music professionals to be able to live out of their profession.

Do you think this system is helpful or is it obstructive?
We are of course very privileged to live in a land where such a big emphasis is put on supporting the arts, but personally I would love to see more funding being shifted to better (read: smarter) trade-based schemes and initiatives. Within the creative industries where music belongs, there are more structures in places within the more traditional cultural support. I feel our potential is even bigger here. A UK report just announced a growth in the cultural industries of almost 10% in 2012, outperforming all other sectors of UK industry. Their exports value increased by 16.1% between 2009-11, compared with an increase of 11.5% for total UK service export. I believe Norway still has a little way to go in maximizing this trade-based part of our funding system. And actually, for a small country like ourselves (little under 5mill) export is actually really solid cultural policy. If you do something in the fringes of the mainstream – you need a global audience. By facilitating for this we are actually at the same time strengthening cultural diversity back home by making more niche artists to be able to live of what they are doing.

‘Smarter ways of structuring funding’

Does it help bring quality to a stage, or does it help to give too many random bands a chance to play which wouldn’t have made it otherwise?
I think you are raising a good question wether funding in itself actually sometimes can work counter intuitive to its initial goals. Yes, in some cases this happens I would say. Funding can be a double-edged sword and one can get to dependent which can in some cases inhibit the entrepreneurial side. But again, this can be avoided with ‘smarter’ ways of structuring funding. Schemes and programs that don’t just passively give out funding but where you as a creative professional is incentivized. But all in all I don’t think this is a too big of a problem. Again, look at the size of Norway and the creative output when it comes to international artists. The 5 Nordic countries, with only 25 million people, account for the most music exports after dominant markets like the US and UK.

Which are the most promising Norwegian acts at the moment.
This is of course a highly personal question but from where we stand and also related to the type of music you often cover in NOTHING BUT HOPE AND PASSION, there are a couple of names that we think you will hear a lot more about in 2015. Some of them you have already covered. Top of my head, I am personally excited about what the future will bring for artists like EMILIE NICOLAS, AURORA, PANDREAS, APOTHEK, HIGHASAKITE, KID ASTRAY, TRULS, to mention a few. Im also excited to see how the new album of SUSANNE SUNDFØR will be received.