Chapter 1: The instrument and the Music
The roots of fiddle music tradition in Norway are both deep and widespread, reaching back before the appearance of both the violin and the hardingfele. When these instruments were introduced, instrumental music already existed in the minds of the people. The development of fiddle playing became, to a large degree, a question of transferring known music to a new instrument, with the changes imposed by the instrument but also taking advantage of the new possibilities opened up by it. In this connection, there remains the enticing problem of determining just how familiar Norwegians were with the use of bowed instruments before the advent of the violin. Little is known of this, however. A suggested hypothesis is that the tenacious drone-playing characteristic of both the Norwegian fiddle types, using open strings as drone accompaniment, reflects back to a musical practice of the Middle Ages (Sevåg 1975, Blom 1985). This may also apply to other aspects of this music.
Even though the roots of fiddle music go beyond the appearance of the violin, this instrument became extremely important for Norway as it did for all of Europe. Its early history is marked by a precise origin in northern Italy in the middle of the 16th century, a rapid spreading to all corners of Europe, and a surprising ability to involve the entire social spectrum, from the feast tables of kings to the taverns of the towns. How Europe's rural folk adopted the violin is a much more varied and complex matter, but there is no doubt that the violin came to achieve as great a significance for European folk music as for classical music.
The fiddle's excellence as a dance instrument was the main reason for its popularity, first in the European cultural centers, and later, to an even higher degree, among the common folk in the towns and rural communities. The spread of the instrument in Norway certainly involved the usual communication centers and roads: cities and densely populated areas along the coast; mining settlements; trade routes along the coast and over the mountains; markets, etc. It also involved local economies and social classes. The 17th century was certainly the starting period not only in cities and densely populated areas, but also in certain areas of rural Norway, although the latter is more difficult to document. The 18th century saw a great expansion into the countryside, culminating in a full bloom in the 19th century. Most notable was the period from about 1750 to 1850 when the 'young' folk arts were manifested simultaneously in rosemaling (decorative painting), acanthus wood carving, and fiddle music.
It is true of all these prominent areas of post-Renaissance folk art that their origins lie partly in European urban culture. It has been an important task for Norwegian cultural research to trace the flow of influences from such centers to rural areas, and to describe and explain the changes which occurred as these influences encountered successively new and different local societies. This investigation is especially difficult in folk music which is mainly transmitted orally and therefore has not been preserved in a tangible form. In addition to the transformations 'on the way' there is all that happened during the long period of time from when the fiddle was well established until when the music was 'collected' in the form of notes and recordings. The initial phase is the most difficult to document. Were the towns important as intermediaries of foreign influences, and if so, how systematic was the mediation?
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