Rotvärk – med Höstorkestern

ROTVÄRK

A musical story created and performed by the music collective Höstorkestern about a network of roots in Tornedalen, discovered as the distance from the culture grows – through songs, tall tales and poems. The storytelling performance Rotvärk is a journey into the soul, where bilingualism is locked away, or given a home.

Höstorkestern is a music collective formed in 2013 with roots in Tornedalen and Malmfälten. They have released four studio albums. The EP Laakson laulut (Dalens sånger) was released during the pandemic in 2021 in collaboration with Kulturföreningen Lava and ISOF (the Institute for Language and Folklore), to create new music in Meänkieli incorporating several village variants of the language.

The story begins in Tornedalen in the 1990s and continues to the present day.

The songs are performed in Swedish and Meänkieli and are mainly Höstorkestern's own, alongside others that have influenced the journey back to the mother tongue.