Sivert Andreas Holmen: Play me a Sea Sámi "slått"

Field of study: Artistic Research

Čuojat munnje mearrasámi “šlotta” / Play me a Sea Sámi “slått” is a project by folk musician and composer Sivert Holmen that explores a music that incorporates Northern Sámi and Norwegian traditional music, and develops this for solo hardanger fiddle and duo with guitarist and performer of joik, Viktor Wilhelmsen (ph.d. fellow at NTNU).

Research Questions

The overarching research questions are:

• How can one perform Northern Sámi and Norwegian traditional music in a common musical expression while preserving the traditions musical uniqueness?
• How can one listen to, practice and explore the “slåttar” from a Sámi perspective and how can one do the same with the joik from a southern Norwegian “slåtte”-perspective?
• How can a Sámi-rooted ecosophical perspective function as a compositional process and method?

The artistic research is based on an ethical conscience and indigenous methodology, and is aware of ethical issues that arise especially in light of the Norwegianization policy, the colonization of Sápmi and the role of the Hardanger fiddle in the construction of Norwegian national identity.