11/03/2006
Duo presents music, stories with Scandinavian style
By: Christopher Weishaar
A mix of traditional Scandinavian music and storytelling was presented in five Mid-Iowa schools and two retirement centers Thursday. Two more schools were scheduled for today, with a weekend workshop and concert and more schools next week.
It's the type of schedule a long-running performance group could expect, but Sarah Granskou and Sarah Nagell - known as the "Canwegian" Sarahs - are accomplishing this type of effort their first time touring together.
"Everybody always comments; they're always surprised to see we've only been together a short time," Granskou said. "We complement each other well I think."
The duo met a couple years ago, but Oct. 10 was their first day together, followed by a few days of practice before heading out on the road for a month of touring with 30 stops.
"It's really a whirlwind tour," Nagell said. "It's just all over, but it's really exciting."
The duo is in central Iowa this week and early next week, stopping at schools and retirement centers, with a public performance at 7 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 4.
Granskou, 32, raised in Ontario, and Nagell, 25, born in Arizona, have both lived and studied music in Norway. Granskou's stay in Norway included living among reindeer herders in northern Norway to learn their music. Nagell was most recently in Norway studying at Telemark University College.
The Story City stop for the duo is funded by a grant from the Iowa Arts Council to Sons of Norway.
"Story City is really special for us," Nagell said. "It's really a wonderful community program."
Saturday's performance will be preceded by a workshop for children from 1 to 3 p.m. during which children will participate in singing and dancing and will help make trolls for the night performance.
Granskou said the one-and-a-half-hour evening performance is hard to define, but could be described as musical theater with folk music, in which the duo helps make the music accessible through storytelling.
"Everybody always says 'that was so different than what I would have expected and it was very unique,'" Granskou said.
