I have permission from the artist to upload this track as part of my undergraduate dissertation, "Sami Joik: Music and Imagination in Arctic Norway".

Bjørnen (Frode Fjellheim)

I have permission from the artist to upload this track as part of my undergraduate dissertation, "Sámi Joik: Music and Imagination in Arctic Norway".

Bjørnejakt (Frode Fjellheim)

Bernt Mikkel Haglund's joik. Composed by Ánte Mikkel Gaup.

When a Sámi person 'joiks someone', they are said to be 'seeing' that person through the power of the joik.  Evidence of the revelatory nature of this image can be identified, it is said, in terms of the spontaneity and ease by which personal joiks come into being ... the joiker Ánte Mihkkal Gaup once explained to me the circumstances by which he came to joik his good friend, Bernt Mikkel Haglund. He had been at a festival and was cleaning up rubbish. All of a sudden, he looked up and saw Bernt Mikkel standing before him. He immediately began to joik his friend and it remains one of two melodies that Bernt Mikkel has received to date".

Part of my undergraduate dissertation, "Sami Joik: Music and Imagination in Arctic Norway".

Mu Festiválaluohti (Bernt Mikkel Haglund's joik)

Eatnamen Vuelie: Deilig Er Jorden (Frode Fjellheim).

Cato Myrnes Olsen's joik. Composed and performed by Ánte Mikkel Gaup. 

"Although joik was originally performed solo and unaccompanied, joiking to a drum beat was once practiced by noaidis (shamans) in order to facilitate communication with a spirit world. In this shamanic context, joik was said to be a gift from  “supernatural beings” (Edström 1985:  160). Although the role of the noaidi has been all but eroded during the last two centuries, joik continues to engage with the sacred on an essential level. As DuBois explains, it is seen as having the “power to encompass and express” its object (DuBois 2006: 71). One does not joik “about” something; one simply “joiks” it. It is thus said to “capture the essence” or “bring to life” its object. Despite hundreds of years of suppression by missionaries and officials who have viewed it as a threat to assimilation, joiking has remained. Especially since the 1960’s, however, Sámi musicians have been expressing themselves in a way that communicates not only with their own cultural heritage, but with forms of music from elsewhere."

Part of my undergraduate dissertation, "Sami Joik: Music and Imagination in Arctic Norway".

Cato Myrnes Olsen's joik

"On the fourth of August 2011, I took a short bus ride from Tromsø city centre, to the university campus where Ánde Somby works in the faculty of law. During our discussions, he explained to me his interest in developing a sketch of joik aesthetics. There are, Somby told me, four main aesthetic types. He joiked for me from behind his office desk. The term "Jarcat" refers to a complex or ‘thick’ form of joik. It requires a high level of virtuosity, and is perhaps the most aesthetically challenging for an outsider. Ánde showed me a definition for Jarcat that he had discovered in a dictionary dating back to 1932:

"Here it is … “singing badly or out of tune”! But it's a Sámi concept where tune is not the issue … the point is that if you suddenly jump into a very skillful joik and you try to do the same as the joiker, then he will try and hook you off … so you have to listen very carefully and be prepared for where he's going".

When Somby was a teenager, he would go to parties and attempt to keep up with more skillful joikers. In this sense, he told me, it was a battle of survival. “They would say, “Well you can follow, boy, but do you have something to come with?” And then I would joik things I knew … and they would try to follow”. Somby compared this process of learning to “a journey through martial arts”; one’s level of technical skill increases only over time".

Part of my undergraduate anthropology dissertation; Sámi Joik: Music and Imagination in Arctic Norway.

Jarcat

Joiker Ande Somby demonstrates a particular type of joik called "Livdet", a much more melodious form, particularly common around the Karasjok area. 

Part of my undergraduate anthropology dissertation, "Sámi Joik: Music and Imagination in Arctic Norway".

Livdet

Ande Somby demonstrates "Deaddilit", a style of joik that has a particular kind of energy, the stress falling only on certain parts of the melody.

Part of my undergraduate anthropology dissertation, "Sámi Joik: Music and Imagination in Arctic Norway".

Deaddilit

Ethnomusicologist and joik expert Ola Graff demonstrates the phenomenon of sound imitation within the joik tradition. 

Part of my undergraduate anthropology dissertation, "Sámi Joik: Music and Imagination in Arctic Norway"

sound imitation - (the Long-Tailed Duck)

"One of my fondest  memories from Sápmi relates to an experience involving a small stream. For some time I had been sitting next to the water, 'joiking' to myself, and allowing my mind to wander.  In a moment of sudden revelation, I realized that the key signature in which I was 'joiking' was the only one that seemed right for the stream! Every time I changed key, the balance was destroyed. I understood that if this had been a different kind of stream - flowing over different contours of land - then the notes I was singing may also have been different. From speaking with many joikers, I now know that this form of inspiration is not uncommon within the joik tradition. On the other hand, the most spontaneous joik that I heard during my time in Sápmi was probably Bernt Mikkel joiking in the shower! It is apparent that a creative engagement with joik cannot be constrained within a single context. Some may joik to streams; others such as Frode Fjellheim find continuity with tradition by stepping over electronic cables".

Part of my undergraduate anthropology dissertation, "Sámi Joik: Music and Imagination in Arctic Norway"

Stream

A live performance of joik and Inuit throat singing by Sara Marielle Gaup Beaska and Sylvia Cloutier at the opening of the Museum for Northern Peoples in Manndalen, northern Norway. 

Part of my undergraduate anthropology dissertation, "Sámi Joik: Music and Imagination in Arctic Norway"

Sara Marielle Gaup Beaska and Sylvia Cloutier

Composer Frode Fjellheim on how the joik tradition inspires his music. He is talking in particular about how certain elements came about in his version of a popular Scandinavian hymn Eatnamen Vuelie: Deilig Er Jorden. 

Frode Fjellheim: 

"I don't just 'steal' phrases and joiks but also other elements …. I was commissioned, for example, to make a choral track for a Christmas CD, and I wrote a piece which is a mixture of an original composition with an arrangement of a hymn that in Norwegian translates as “Wonderful is the Earth”… When I composed it I used the title as a clue … I looked down since the clue was to do with “the earth‟. There was a bunch of cables on the floor. I started working, and picked a note [at this point he demonstrated stepping over the cables, with his voice ascending and descending 'in-  step']  … I think the traditional way of making joik has actually been very basic at times; simply a reflection of shape and other properties. That is what I am still doing by jumping over cables in a messy studio – although I guess it's not very romantic! I still have the joik way in mind"

(personal interview, 12/08/2011, Trondheim)

Part of my undergraduate anthropology dissertation, "Sámi Joik: Music and Imagination in Arctic Norway"

The 'Joik Way'

The music on this site contributes towards the soundtrack of my undergraduate anthropology dissertation, "Sámi Joik: Music and Imagination in Arctic Norway" (2011)

Merlyn Driver



Joik Research (2011)

Popular tracks