Margaret Mikulska asks:

>What happened to Bo Nillson (or Nilson)?

Well he's alive and well, he had a kind of metamorfosis in the late sixties
when he left his past musical life and started writing music for films
and a number of songs (some quite good) in a tonal language that is very
konsonat- I belive that he never really quit writing art-music even if he
more or less denounced it...

As for Nordic surnames and its tradtition, we do as follows:  As it has
mostly been of paternal lineage, we take the name of the father, in this
case "Nils" adding an ipso facto that Bo is his son:  hence making the
surnamne:  Nils + son = Nilsson - If the first name do not end on an "S"
like Nils, say for example Margaret (maternal lineage in Nordic surnmanes
are very uncommon!) we have to add an "S" between Margaret and son to
distinguish whos son it is:  Margaret's son which makes Margarets + son =
Margaretsson.  You may exchange the "son" ending for daughter (dotter) if
You are such a beast.  The English language use of the "son" name ending
possible stems from the Vikings rumaging around and setteling in the UK
1100 years ago, at that time the islanders decided not to adhere to strict
Nordic spelling rules and ditched the extra "s" for comfort 8^)

What has this to do whit music? Nothing really, but it will give You some
understanding why some of us from the Northern corner of Europe get quite
defensive when the english-languaged world spell our composers names
poorly..

There where some other mails in this thread needing comment:

John Dalmas wrote;

>Did anyone mention composer Eduard Tubin? Eleven symphonies!
>I assume he was Swedish.  Not?

He spent the latter half of his life here, but he was a refugee from his
native Estonia, and even if I would love to, I belive that we must say that
he was Estonian.

Peter Wisse writes:

>Swedish musicians: Oivin Fjeldstad (conductor), Kirsten Flagstadt
>(beautiful in Sibelius songs)

Both are unfortunarly Norwegian..

>Was Einar Englund Swedish

Englund is a difficult case:  Finnish father, Swedish mother, born on the
same island as myself (Gotland, in the middle of the Baltic sea) - but he
grew up in Finland, was educated there, but he spent most of his adult
summers composing at the fammily cottage on the island.  I belive that
he was a Finnish composer by choice and conviction!

Peter Wisse in a nother post:

>I am not sure if the pianist Sivolov is Swedish

Yes, Niklas Sivelov is Swedish and not only a fine pianist, but also a
composer of some distiction:  He played the premie a new piano concerto
himself in October.

peter lundin, gothenburg.se   =8B    Counting the days: DDS 100 (1906-2006)