About the project

Since the very early days of the introduction of portable recording equipment, Finnish researchers have been recording folk music and oral traditions. As a result there are tens of thousands of hours of recorded folk tradition stored in various archives.

One of the most influential and active of all was Erkki Ala-Könni (1911-1996), Head of the Department of Folk Tradition at University of Tampere. Ala-Könni was Alan Lomax´s contemporary and compiled one of the largest collections in Finland, approximately 8000 hours of folk tradition. He began his life-long journey to the realms of folk tradition in the early 1940´s and continued until his death in 1996.

The project at hand – The Masters of Finnish Folk Music – aims to release a carefully edited and researched selection of Erkki Ala-Könni´s field recordings from the early 1940´s to 1980´s as a series of CDs. The project can be compared to the publication of Alan Lomax´s collections.

One of the main purposes of the project is to promote the rich diversity of Finnish folk music heritage to an international audience. The CD-series will be edited and compiled so that they will also provide a rich and valid source of scientific methods and study. As a complimentary element of the project, a series of written articles will be published in various scientific and popular folk music-oriented media.

Up-to-date information on the progress of the project will be presented online at www.aitorecords.com/alakonni. Throughout the project, the editors will be lecturing on the subject, as well as attending international archive conferences.

The first phase of the project includes the editing and release of two CDs. This project is being funded by the Finnish Cultural Foundation and the releases will be published by the award-winning Finnish world music label Aito Records. The first two releases will be out in the beginning of 2008.