The Bagpipe Society

CD Review: Wessmanlandsbitar

Wessmanlandsbitar is an album by Folke Dahlgren & Bruno Andersen playing Swedish bagpipes (säckpipa) and hurdy-gurdy. The album was successfully crowdfunded in the summer of 2021 and is now released upon an unsuspecting world. It is quite simply an hour of pure drone heaven. These two musicians interweave the melodies and harmonies in and around each other as if they were one. At times it is hard to believe that there are just two musicians playing such is the richness of the arrangements.

The tunes all originate from the county of Västmanland in Sweden (which lies to the south of Dalarna and to the west of Stockholm). Music from this region often tends to be neglected in favour of music from more northerly regions, but there is a hidden wealth of music from the Västmandland and Folke specialises in it. He was awarded the prestigious Silver Riksspelman award in 2013 allowing himself to be titled musician of the realm. He is one of only a handful of säckpipa players to be bestowed this title. His background is Jazz/rock guitar and bluegrass banjo.

Bruno is a former prog metal drummer/classical schooled percussionist who has now made the jump to full time Hurdy-gurdyist. His background as a percussionist stands him in excellent stead to be a full rhythm section on the gurdy.

Every track on this album is a gem - from slow brudmarsches (bridal marches ) to various different types of polska no musical rock is left unturned. Every possible musical device has been used to make a nice harmonic rhythmic beautiful album with as much variety as you’d expect from an album with a plethora of instruments on it - instead of just two!

One of the crowdfunding rewards was a pdf of all of the tunes written out. This is an invaluable resource and can also be purchased for a modest fee. A must have album for every säckpipa player!

The album is available on all good digital media and in hard copy form direct from them, contact via their Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/bordunduo