ICH North – passing on our musical heritage

The Aurora area has a very rich and distinctive immaterial cultural heritage in the form of music. The musical heritage in the Aurora area has both similarities and distinct local and regional differences, and includes heritage of minorities. Immigrants bring their own musical heritage with them. In today’s society, it is not certain that the transmission of musical heritage to new practitioners will happen. This leads to a loss of traditional knowledge. The causes might be migration, urbanization, social distancing between age groups, low media visibility/low interest due to lack of information, networks or good safeguarding practices. Safeguarding that support performance and transmission are called for.  

ICH North tackles the challenges with a number of actions that deal with different aspects on how to promote the transmission of musical heritage in the Aurora area, considering that the area is sparsely inhabited with long distances. Traditional music in the Nordic countries has very limited human and financial resources, across the board. Cultural cross-border partnerships, networks and joint development and implementation of actions through the project will strengthen the sector and promote transmission more effectively.  

Intangible cultural heritage, especially musical heritage, and communities upholding it, cross all administrative borders. 

Musical heritage as a concept might be strongly connected with folk music, but there are also a lot of other vocal and instrumental traditions that can be seen as musical heritage, as well as f.ex. the knowledge on how to build instruments. Following the approach of Unesco’s Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage, any living musical tradition or a related skill that a community or individual feel that is important to pass on to following generations, could be seen as musical heritage. 

ICH North promoted cross-border cooperation related to musical ICH and enhanced the role of musical communities in the area, building bridges between institutions, educational institutions and heritage communities. The project developed new joint innovative services and products in cultural and creative industries, including digitization and digital innovations. The project was community-based in accordance with the UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (2003) and used co-creation between communities and institutions with a bottom-up approach.

The approach of the project was demand-based and held sustainability as a keyword. The project gave musical heritage more visibility, using social innovations to transfer knowledge and revitalize ICH/music, thus furthering safeguarding.

The project was funded by Interreg Aurora, with co-financing by Region Västernorrland, Troms og Finnmarks fylkeskommune, Nordisk Kulturfond and Lapin Liitto as well as the project partners: Centria University of Applied Sciences, Kulturens Bildningsverksamhet, Svenska Folkdansringen, KulturÖsterbotten, Novia University of Applied Sciences, The Arctic University of Norway UiT, the Finnish Folk Music Institute and Västernorrlands Museum. The project was planned as a part of an Interreg Nord-funded project, also called ICH North.

During the three-year project several different project actions were developed and implemented in a total of five work packages:

1. A Massive Open Online Course (MOOC)

The subject of the course is safeguarding of musical heritage in the north of Finland, Sweden and Norway, including Sápmi. Anyone can attend and course material is open source.

2. A digital map of musical communities practicing and transmitting their musical heritage

The content is co-created with communities throughout the Aurora area, consisting of video material with members of the communities describing how they pass on their musical heritage.

3. Educational material on intangible cultural heritage for non-formal education

The goal was to use social innovations in order to promote the transmission of knowledge/intangible cultural heritage and enhance participation and inclusion.

Activities included:

• educational material on ICH
• educational workshops and inspirational meetings
• a pilot group/community for testing actions taken to increase social inclusion and webinars with physical nodes.

4. Musical heritage, entrepreneurship and cultural tourism

These were promoted through cultural innovations, tandem meetings for musicians and entrepreneurs and a community. This work package focused on branding and promoting local cultural and musical heritage with possible products and innovations for cultural tourism.

5. A joint strategy for community involvement in safeguarding musical heritage for archives in the Aurora area

The project established a network of music communities and museums and archives in the Aurora region, mapped the community level needs and opinions and elaborated a joint strategy and road map ahead. Main topics in the road map are ownership related to traditional knowledge, community involvement in the documentation work and dissemination of the materials (community and general levels). The actions included negotiations with other heritage organizations, practitioner workshops and open webinars.

FINAL REPORT

Open Access Final Report of ICH North

PROJECT LEAFLET

PRIVACY STATEMENT

For producing and co-producing content for the different activities in the project, gathered material such as interviews, photos, videos. We made a privacy statement for the project and you can read it here:

in English * in Swedish * in Finnish

PRESS RELEASE

OUR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS:

DISCUSSION POSTERS

We’ve made a poster with some questions regarding musical traditions and cultural heritage. You are welcome to use it too for discussions in your own groups and communities:
ICH North discussion poster (ENG/FIN/SWE)
ICH North discussion poster (ENG/NOR/Northern Sápmi)
or only in Finnish.

ICH NORTH SPOTIFY & YOUTUBE PLAYLISTS

The playlists with heritage music in the Interreg Aurora area consists of hours of music. The aim of the playlists is to get an overview of the heritage music and the playlist would be one way to discover what the musical heritage in the region really consists of. The profiles of the playlists slightly differ the Spotify list concentrating on professional musicians and groups, and the Youtube list presenting also communities and locally known tradition bearers.

ICH BINGO AND INTERVIEW FORM

Play Intangible Living Heritage Summer Bingo!

For your summer amusement we have created a bingo encouraging your holiday activities towards intangible cultural heritage! Play and let the world know what you did by reporting about your activities with the hashtag #summerheritage #ichbingo

Form for a short ICH interview

We have also made a small interview form for intergenerational interviews. You can print it for all those asking for something to do during the holidays!

Print out your bingo chart and interview sheet (pdf):

in English * in Swedish * in Finnish

ARTICLES ON MUSICAL HERITAGE

(in Idébanken 2024) An article in Swedish on the importance of music and togetherness that spans generations by Johanna Björkholm.

DISCUSSION CARDS FOR A TANDEM MEETING

We have made printout cards with questions that will help getting a discussion started, for meetings between an entrepreneur and musician/representative of music community. With the help from these cards you can arrange a tandem-meeting, combining entrepreneurship and traditional music!
ENG * SWE * NOR * FIN

WORKSHOP MATERIAL ON CONNECTING CULTURAL HERITAGE AND TRAVEL

Workshop structure and product planning form (pdf):

• in Finnish
• in Swedish
• in English

Printable bingo forms for extra fun and reflection at the end of the workshop:

• in Finnish
• in Swedish
• in English

FOLK LIKE A LOCAL – PLAYLIST POSTERS AND LEAFLETS

The “Folk like a local”-poster is an easily printable, nice looking A3 poster with a QR-code to a YouTube-playlist that contains heritage music from a village or a region. The posters can be put up at appropriate places such as museums, restaurants, common gathering places, notice boards, libraries, harbors and wherever people tend to hang around. 

The aim is to make local musical heritage visible in new places, for tourists, local inhabitants and anyone interested to discover. The QR-code make it possible to follow how many have scanned the code. You can also see how many that have listened to the playlists. 

We thought it’d be good to include information of the name of the playlist on the poster, so you can search for it in case you don’t usually scan QR-codes. It’s also good to provide contact information in case someone wants to add material to the lists. 

The “Folk like a local” poster was piloted in Replot, Vallgrund & Björkö, Lappfjärd, Närpes, Kälviä and Ångermanland-Medelpad. As you can see, the poster can be made both for a smaller village or municipality – or a larger region. 

A4 posters pdf:

Replot – Björkö – Vallgrund * Lappfjärd * Närpes * Kälviä * Ångermanland-Medelpad

Flyers/social media:

Direct links to the Youtube playlists:

• Närpes playlist
• Kälviä playlist
• Lappfjärd playlist
• Replot, Björkö & Vallgrund playlist
• Ångermanland-Medelpad playlist

Want to create your own Folk like a local -poster? Use our Power Point -template!

You can create your own poster with our template, or contact Mats Granfors at Novia UAS for more information (mats.granfors@novia.fi). 

1. Prepare a Youtube playlist with your local/regional music.
2. On the playlist website, right click > Create a QR code for this page > Download

and then download this file:

and then follow these instructions:

• Right click on the background photo > Change picture to a local photo of your choice
• Right click on the QR code > Change picture to the QR code you just created and downloaded
• Edit the ”Village name” text in the title and below the QR code
• Save as pdf, print and share!
• (You can also edit the ”Listen to local folk music” text, if you wish to translate it into your own language)

MEMOS OF THE DIGITAL MEETINGS FOR ORGANIZERS

Are you an organizer who cares about keeping cultural heritage alive? Then this is for you!

Here are the memos of three digital meetings that served as a meeting place getting to know organizers across national borders, sharing experiences and lessons learned. The memos are in Swedish.

Future & Sustainable Events – how we build long-term sustainability together

ARTICLES ON MUSICAL HERITAGE, TOURISM & ENTREPRENEURSHIP

• Närpes glassfabrik & Folkmusik i Sydösterbotten (in Swedish)
• Sven Keskitalo: Musik utan gränser (in Swedish) and Sven Keskitalo: Musiikkia ilman rajoja (in Finnish)
• Musical heritage in relation to entrepreneurship and cultural tourism (the RDI-blog of Novia UAS) A blog text in English by Mats Granfors, Kati Hyvönen and Sara Kåll-Fröjdö on the collaboration between local entrepreneurs and heritage communities.
• Aineettoman kulttuuriperinnön hyödyntäminen matkailussa (Centria Bulletin 29.10.2025) An article in Finnish by Kati Hyvönen and Sara Kåll-Fröjdö on the outcome of a workshop on living heritage for tourism actors.
• Musikarv möter rörelseglädje på Jeppis Gym (in Swedish)

ICH NORTH WEBINAR RECORDINGS

ARTICLES ON MUSICAL HERITAGE, COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT & ARCHIVES

• Notes from the archives: Olga captured, museum preserved, musicians brought to life (in English) and in Finnish
• Digital resources for folk music

ICH NORTH WEBINAR RECORDINGS

ICH North articles on musical heritage and education

• Om dragspel och spelglädje (in Swedish)
• Letting the Tone, Tune and Traditional Musicianship Guide the Way – an article by Sofia Joons
• Fiolpedagogen David Norlins samling och nivågradering av folkmusiklåter från Skandinavien (in Swedish)
• Musikaliskt immateriellt kulturarv – social hållbarhet i pedagogiskt arbete (in Swedish)

ICH North Map is a digital map of musical communities practicing and transmitting their musical heritage in the Aurora area.

Read our latest newsletter for project updates, partner presentations and other news in the field of intangible cultural heritage.

ARTICLES

We have also made some longer articles for the newsletter, you can find them here as pdf:

• Om dragspel och spelglädje (in Swedish)

• Letting the Tone, Tune and Traditional Musicianship Guide the Way – an article by Sofia Joons
• Närpes glassfabrik & Folkmusik i Sydösterbotten (in Swedish)
• Fiolpedagogen David Norlins samling och nivågradering av folkmusiklåter från Skandinavien (in Swedish)
• Notes from the archives: Olga captured, museum preserved, musicians brought to life (in English) and in Finnish
• Sven Keskitalo: Musik utan gränser (in Swedish) and Sven Keskitalo: Musiikkia ilman rajoja (in Finnish)

Published articles by the project

• När klangen, låten och spelmanskapet får styra (Fiolen min 1/2025 page 14) An article in Swedish by Sofia Joons
• ”Folkmusik som levande tradition” (Replot Byablad 1/2025) An article in Swedish by Johanna Björkholm
• ”Synlighet för levande kulturarv via QR-koder” (Hembygden 2/2025) An article in Swedish by Mats Granfors, Therese Hugosson, Sara Kåll-Fröjdö, Kati Hyvönen
• Musical heritage in relation to entrepreneurship and cultural tourism (the RDI-blog of Novia UAS) A blog text in English by Mats Granfors, Kati Hyvönen and Sara Kåll-Fröjdö on the collaboration between local entrepreneurs and heritage communities.
• Särpräglad folkmusiktradition i Replot (Tidskriften Skärgård 4/2024) An article in Swedish by Johanna Björkholm on the young folk musician Janeta Österberg and the musical heritage of the Replot archipelago.
• Aineettoman kulttuuriperinnön hyödyntäminen matkailussa (Centria Bulletin 29.10.2025) An article in Finnish by Kati Hyvönen and Sara Kåll-Fröjdö on the outcome of a workshop on living heritage for tourism actors.
• Lyckan är ett folkmusikjam (in Idébanken 2024) An article in Swedish on the importance of music and togetherness that spans generations by Johanna Björkholm.
• A reflection on the use of languages in cross-border projects (Centria Bulletin 14.12.2023) An article in English by Kati Hyvönen and Sara Kåll-Fröjdö

Articles and programs about the project

• Meet Johanna Salmi, Financial Coordinator at Centria University of Applied Sciences (Interreg Aurora website 6.11.2024)
• Meet Mats Granfors, Senior Music Lecturer, Novia University of Applied Sciences (Interreg Aurora website 17.9.2024)
• Folkmusikupplevelser vid Kukkolaforsen (Fiolen min, nr 3/2024 page 22)
• Deutsche Welle made a TV-program on EU-funded projects in Europe and visited Kaustinen and ICH North in June 2023. Kaustinen clips here:
  • English in DW site and in Youtube
  • German in DW site and in Youtube
  • Spanish in DW site and in Youtube
  • The program was a special edition from Brussels, in English and you’ll find the link here (Kaustinen/ICH North in approx. the 3 last minutes of the program)
• Det musikaliska kulturarven i norra Norden stärks (Fiolen min, nr 1/2023 page 11)
• ”Unik och rik jättesatsning på folkmusiken i norra Norden” (Spelmannen 1/2023)
• ”Kansanmusiikki-instituutti mukana miljoonahankkeessa” (Kansanmusiikki 1/23)
• Radio interview with Johanna Björkholm: ”Det musikaliska kulturarvet bevaras i nytt projekt” (Yle Vega, available 24.1.2023-15.3.2025)

These organizations/musicians have signed a Letter of Intent (in alphabetical order): 

• Burträsksvängen och Västerbottens spelmansförbund (SE) 
• Festival Kalottspel (NO) 
• Finlandssvenska spelmansförbundet (FI) 
• Folk You (SE) 
• Folkemusikk Nord (NO) 
• Folkmusiksällskapet (FI) 
• Härnösands folkhögskola (SE) 
• Härnösands kommun (SE) 
• Jamtli (SE) 
• Kansanmusiikkiliitto (FI) 
• Kulturskolan Sundsvall (SE) 
• Lappfjärds folkhögskola (FI) 
• Målselv Spelmanslag (NO) 
• Medelpads folkmusikförbund (SE) 
• Musik i Västernorrland (SE) 
• Niklas Roswall (SE) 
• Norrbottens Spelmansförbund (SE) 
• Riksförbundet för Folkmusik och Dans (SE) 
• Saamelaisarkisto Sami arkiiva (FI) 
• Studieförbundet Bilda Nord (SE) 
• Svenska litteratursällskapet i Finland (FI)
• Örebro Universitet (SE) 

Project Administration Personnel at Centria University of Applied Sciences:

Sara Kåll-Fröjdö

Project Administration

sara.kall-frojdo@centria.fi

+358 40 4879634

Johanna Salmi

Project Controller

johanna.salmi@centria.fi

+358 40 6618887

Kati Hyvönen

Project Communication

kati.hyvonen@centria.fi

Project Working Group Representatives / Experts in the field of traditional music, intangible cultural heritage, music education and archives:

Centria University of Applied Sciences

Annika Mylläri

annika.myllari@centria.fi

+358 40 6351040

Kansanmusiikki-instituutti ry/Finnish Folk Music Institute

Matti Hakamäki

matti.hakamaki@kaustinen.fi

+358 40 3588921

Lauri Oino

lauri.oino@kaustinen.fi

+358 50 350 4600

Folkdansringen

Therese Hugosson

therese.hugosson@folkdansringen.se

 +46 72 72 72 006

Kultur Österbotten

Eva-Marie Backnäs

eva-marie.backnas@kulturosterbotten.fi

+358 44 750 3123

Novia University of Applied Sciences

Mats Granfors

mats.granfors@novia.fi

 +358 50 4725929

The Arctic University of Norway UiT

Michael Strobelt

michael.strobelt@uit.no

+47 77 66 05 43

Västernorrlands Museum

Bengt Wittgren

bengt.wittgren@vnmuseum.se

 +46 70 698 86 80