Exploring Scandinavia

Norwegian jazz guitarist Hedvig Mollestad Thomassen was titled ‘Young Jazz Talent of the Year’, in 2009, 27 years old. Listen to the noise of a Norwegian jazz guitarist.

Since then, she and her trio, Hedvig Mollestad Trio, has released a series of albums, and nobody can make a noise quite like this power trio. Her last album, the seventh full-length recording, ‘Ding Dong. You’re Dead’ was released last year. The trio is Hedvig Mollestad Thomassen, guitar; Ellen Brekken, bass and Ivar Loe Bjørnstad, drums.

Ding Dong, You’re Dead

On this record the band seems to prefer to stomp rather than swing. Or, put another way, use the swing and shuffle of jazz to add texture and dynamics to its loud, high-octane compositions in the manner of the Jimi Hendrix Experience or the James Gang.

Thomassen was born in Ålesund and is a graduate from the Norwegian Academy of Music. She has performed with a variety of rock and jazz bands, including her own Hedvig Mollestad Trio, Bronco Busters, Songs and Sweet Potatoes. She also has a central role in the bands of Jarle Bernhoft and Hilde Marie Kjersem, and has performed with Trondheim Jazz Orchestra.

Related: Norwegian Jazz Trio Remixing European Jazz Culture

“So cool that she deserves her own harstag”

The Hedvig Mollestad trio is blending hard rock swagger with jazz harmonic precision and a psychedelic atmosphere. When they released the album ‘Black Stabat Mater’ in 2016, the Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet wrote, “The trio accelerates with the same gruff feel as a snappy sports car.” “In the modern guitar trio tradition, where Schorch Trio, Krokofant and Bushman’s Revenge have set up signs, Hedvig Mollestad’s trio hatch-parks smoothly and loudly, with a good distance from the others,” wrote Aftenposten, while Dagens Næringsliv believed that “Mollestad’s playing is so cool and characteristic that it deserves its own hashtag.”

The trio has received numerous appraising reviews internationally, for both their studio albums and live performances. Their music is inspired by ’70s heavyrock, but creates a peculiar musical mixture of ingredients like free jazz, prog and psychedelia. On its website the band describes their own music as “Outgoing & progressive instrumental rock”. Since the trio’s formation in 2009, HMT has played many concerts and jazz festivals in both Norway and abroad and they have toured in Europe, Malaysia, Japan and the USA.

Related: The Power of Norway’s Best-Selling Jazz-Artist

Made music since she was very little

Fusion is a much-maligned word. But it’s appropriate for HMT music, as it draws so many elements – jazz, hard rock, psych – into a unified whole. Although Hedvig is the owner of one of Norway’s most characteristic guitar voices, for a long time she was not at all sure if it was music she should devote herself to. When she grew up on Bogneset just outside Ålesund, she enjoyed both playing volleyball, reading books, and was above average interested in fishing.

But she has made music since she was very little. She can even remember the very first songs she made. Hedvig also made a short theatre piece, with music, when she was very young.

When the trio released the album Enfant Terrible in 2014, one critique wrote, “Many bands use the studio as something different than live performance — and there’s no doubt that there’s better control over sound — but Hedvig Mollestad Trio makes clear, on all its recordings, that it is recorded live in the studio. It’s a challenge to make records that capture the sheer energy, monumental power and flat-out attitude of live performance, but as much as Hedvig Mollestad Trio kicks serious butt onstage, it manages to do the same thing in the studio.”

The Noise of a Norwegian Jazz Guitarist, written by Tor Kjolberg

London-based Norwegian Elisabeth Krohn defines herself as a witch. She is the editor of Sabat, a magazine about modern witchcraft. The girl from Oslo is fascinated by the dark female characters out there. Read more about Norwegian witchcraft.

Elisabeth is Founder, editor-in-chief and creative director at Sabat Magazine, co-founder and managing director at Dreadful Press and editorial advisor for Suspira Magazine. Formerly fashion writer for Glass Magazine. She was also art director for the free newspaper Again Magazine for the charity Love Your Clothes in 2015.

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Norwegian witchcraft

Elisabeth Krohn explains that today’s witches do not necessarily cast curses or do magic, but use crystals, tarot cards and meditation in an attempt to develop themselves and others. Some years ago, she was inspired by the esoteric inclinations of Swedish painter Hilma af Klint and curated an exhibition and catalogue where six artists presented their visions of modern Witchcraft and feminism. With disciplines ranging from photography to sculpture and painting to performance, each of The Six presented their personal Witchcraft for the future.

International living witches

American rapper Azealia Banks caused a Twitter storm when she declared in 2015 that she was a witch. Banks elaborated in later interviews that she practiced purification rituals that involved hatching eggs on herself.

When pop icon Beyonce released her symbol-heavy record “Lemonade” In 2016, she embraced strong, wild female figures and black magic.

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Sabat Magazine

Elisabeth launched Sabat Magazine in March 2016. The magazine was shortlisted for the Stack Magazine of the Year Award in 2016 and 2017, and commended in the category Art Director of the Year 2017, and took home a Pencil in the Independent Magazine category at the D&AD Awards 2017. The full Le Tarot de L’étoile Cachée – Major & Minor Arcana – was a finalist in the Antalis Creative Power Award (Packaging & Promotional) in 2022.

Living Scandinavian witches

“I don’t feel quite at home in the concept of witchcraft and the modern new age movement. It is the connection to nature that stands out the strongest for me. I look back to the Norse, to Sami religion and western esoteric theory,” says Swedish Mimmi Strinnholm @thislemilk.

“I don’t know if I want to call myself a witch, but I’m part of a movement of people dressed in black who look back on our history and believe in spirituality, intuition and the forces of nature,” says Norwegian Sara Hestetun @sarapest

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The last person to be executed for witchcraft in Central Norway

The case of Lisbeth Pedersdatter Nypan and her husband Ole was brought to international attention with the publication of Rossell Hope Robbins’ Encyclopedia of Witchcraft and Demonology (1959).

The ageing couple, who owned a farm at Leinstrand in the modern-day municipality of Trondheim, had their estate confiscated and were both executed in September 1670. Then the case was closed.

However, the memory of Lisbeth Nypan has survived in the public imagination, and she is something of a Norwegian ‘national witch’, surrounded by numerous myths and stories.

In recent years fictional tales, local historical and genealogical books, yearbooks, and encyclopedia articles have told her story; in 2005, she was even memorialized with her own statue in front of Nypvang primary school in Trondheim.

Norwegian Witchcraft, compiled by Tor Kjolberg

Feature image (on top): Kirsten Iversdatter (Norwegian Scitech News)