Northfield’s ArtOrg will sponsor an evening of traditional old-time Scandinavian dance music at 7 pm this Friday, February 15 at the downtown J. Grundy’s Reub ‘N’ Stein Upstairs at 503 Division Street. Two regional bands will split the bill — Multe from Northfield, MN and Foot-Notes from Decorah, IA — providing plenty of waltzes, polkas, tangos and more for your listening and dancing pleasure. This concert is week five in the twelve-week 2008 ArtOrg Winter Concert Series.

There will be an introductory dance lesson at 7 p.m. Dance music will be the highlight of the evening from 8-11 p.m. There is a $5 per person donation for the evening and this goes to support the music. The evening’s groups/musicians have also been invited to play together after 11 p.m at The Contented Cow FOOT-NOTES from Decorah, Iowa includes Beth Hoven Rotto (fiddle), Jim Skurdal (mandolin, lead vocal), Jon Rotto (guitar, vocals) and Bill Musser (bass, vocals). The group formed in 1991 to carry on a tradition of monthly old time dances in a rustic two-room schoolhouse in Highlandville, Iowa, where area residents have been gathering for years. The old time music they play reflects their ties to Norwegian-American communities in the area. Most of their repertoire consists of dance tunes that were popular at house parties, barn dances, and “Bowery” dances in northeast Iowa around the turn of the century and into the first few decades of the 1900s. They also incorporate a number of danceable tunes from European traditions—including Finnish, Norwegian and Swedish. Foot-Notes have represented Iowa at the Smithsonian Institution’s Festival of American Folklife on the National Mall in Washington, DC and have been featured on Norwegian National Radio (NRK). They have released two CDs, Decorah Waltz and My Father Was A Fiddler.

MULTE includes Jon Bjork (five-row chromatic accordion, guitar), Drew Dixon (guitar), Brad Easterson (fiddle, mandolin, recorder), Gordon Oschwald (bass), Ruth Sylte (piano accordion, melodeon, vocals) Virginia Windschitl (fiddle) and, when possible, Andrea Een (fiddle and traditional Norwegian Hardanger fiddle]. The group grew out of Northfield’s Nordic Jam night on Monday evenings, now at the local Eagle’s Club, which has been meeting since 2002. They play acoustic music from the Nordic countries (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, the Faeroe Islands and Greenland) and their immigrant communities in North America, most of it dance tunes. The group members have deep Scandinavian roots and together they represent more than eight decades of experience playing traditional Nordic folk music. Members of Multe have performed at folk music/dance venues in Canada, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and the USA, including the American Swedish Institute, Musik ved Siljan, Nisswastamman, Nordlek and Norsk Hostfest.