WTJU Jun 23rd, 2021 | By Ralph Graves
Every person has a story. And every country has a musical tradition. In the 1970s Bo Hyttner ran the Sterling record store in Stockholm. He could see that Sweden’s musical story wasn’t being told. Classical labels would occasionally have the popular movement from Lars Erik Larsson’s “Winter’s Tale,” but little else.
Sten Frykberg was conducting the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra in an all-Swedish music program. A customer suggested Hyttner record the concert, and he did. And then recorded more.
From 1976 to 1981 the Sterling label recorded and released Swedish orchestras playing their country’s repertoire. Selections ranged from the Baroque (Johan Agrell’s 1740 Sinfonia in F) to the modern (Sven-Eric Johanson’s 1963 Variations on a grouse lek of Värmland).