Nordic Music Journeys 2025: Sweden and Scotland

The first Nordic Music Journeys events came from friendships and partnerships that formed during the planning of Nordic Music Days 2024, which was hosted by Scotland. The aim is to explore relationships and links between the two cultural scenes, to exchange and experience work, and to learn from and be inspired by each other.

The initial Sweden and Scotland event, in January 2024, saw Gothenburg-based Gagego! and Scotland’s own Hebrides Ensemble play 15 works across 3 concerts, with 4 amibsonic works also programmed.

A second showcase of work by Swedish and Scottish composers will be held in Glasgow on 6 October, in collaboration with the Föreningen Svenska Tonsättare (Swedish Society of Composers) and supported by STIM (the Swedish Performing Rights Society). Scottish Ensemble will perform a lunchtime concert, and there will be a concert of electronic works in the afternoon. It will link in with a Composer Expo event and other events taking place in Glasgow around the same date. More information can be found here.

Aud the Deep-Minded

The brainchild of clarinetist and composer Joanna Nicholson, Aud the Deep-Minded reframes the language of modern opera. Scored for voice, clarinet, horn and electronics, and with influences from the likes of Sinead O’Brien and Yard Act blended with 9th century church music and Norwegian folk, it’s about as far away from Mozart as you can imagine - except it isn’t - the structures of aria and recitative are very much in there, just transformed for the 21st century.

Aud the Deep Minded was a real historical figure, a Viking who lived in Ireland and Scotland and whom history has recorded as being a great leader.

“Aud is usually presented as strong and authoritative, but I wondered, what if she wasn’t like that, what if she was a more vulnerable, reluctant leader. How might she have felt about the circumstances in which she found herself?”

The show uses improvised word play on the changing pronunciations of Aud’s name in different languages to reflect on her status as an immigrant, and musical source material from church and folk backgrounds blends Aud's affinities with both Christianity and paganism.

Aud the Deep-Minded premiered at soundfestival in 2024, and was part of the curated Made in Scotland programme at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2025, and is available for booking for festivals or touring.

Reviews and audience comments can be found here.

Photo: FatManSkinnyCamera

Billed as a “groundbreaking new chamber opera”, I would say it more than lives up to that description.
Will Quinn, theqr.co.uk

A must-see for anyone craving innovative, atmospheric, and emotionally resonant performance.
Sinners’ Review 

UNM - Scottish Composer Exchange

The first UNM x NMD Composer Exchange took place as part of Nordic Music Days in 2024 when, with support from the Scottish Government’s Nordic Office, four Scottish composers travelled to Örebro, Sweden, to attend the UNM Festival. They were paired up with composers from Iceland, Norway, Sweden, and Finland, with whom they then co-composed new works which were premiered in Glasgow during Nordic Music Days.

Supported by the Scottish Government’s Nordic Office once more, two composers from Scotland travelled to this year’s festival in Finland during the last week of August, where they took part in workshops, attended concerts, and engaged with a network of Nordic composers, creators, and performers.

Discussions about Scotland’s involvement in the 2026 UNM festival are currently under way.

Nordic Music Days

Nordic Music Days is the world’s longest running contemporary music festival, with its first edition taking place in 1888. A collaboration between the Composer Societies of the Nordic countries, it is a nomadic festival which moves between countries each year, with a focus on building a network and community, exchanging and supporting work from across the region, and as an important opportunity to showcase and explore a wide range of musical developments.

The festival has taken place outwith the Nordic regions on three occasions – in Berlin (2002), London (2017) and in Glasgow (2024). The Glasgow edition was the largest yet, with orchestral concerts from the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, BBC Scottish Chamber Orchestra, and Scottish Chamber Orchestra, a 16-channel ambisonic speaker set up, sound walks, film screenings, installations, a late night festival club, and concerts from groups including Red Note Ensemble, Hebrides Ensemble, Scottish Ensemble, Nordic Viola, defunensemble, Ensemble Temporum, KATA, Drake Music Scotland, and Elefantöra.

Discussions are currently taking place about Scotland’s involvement in the next festival, and ensuring that there is a legacy of connection and exchange between Scotland and the Nordic region.

nordicmusicdays.org

Rookh Quartet

The Rookh Quartet began life in 2017 when four of Scotland's horn players decided to get together regularly to explore - and expand - the horn quartet repertoire. The original plan did not involve doing any concerts - the idea was to get together regularly, to enjoy playing chamber music. This changed when the University of Glasgow offered the Rookh Quartet a lunchtime concert, and the group has since gone on to play in venues and festivals that include The Cathedral of the Isles, soundfestival, Orkney's St Magnus Festival, The Night With…, and as featured artist in the British Horn Society’s Scottish Horn Day, as well as joining players from the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Royal Scottish National Orchestra and Scottish Opera for an International Horn Society project during the Covid pandemic.

Their commitment to new music and to creating balanced programmes that reflect the group’s make up and interests has meant that they have commissioned new works from Lynda Nicholson, Alisson Kruusmaa, Drew Hammond, Louise Harris, and Jane Stanley, premiered a quartet by Joyce Solomon Moorman, and gave the first European performances of Tyler Taylor’s quartet.

The quartet also regularly include works from the romantic and classical eras in their programmes, as well as duos, trios, and works for natural horn. They recently recorded their first album on the TNW Music label (release date tbc) and have plans to commission a number of new works over the next few years.

The Rookh Quartet is available for performances, festivals and touring, and can combine with other musicians for chamber and orchestral concerts.

rookhquartet.eu