Skye Consort & Emma Björling

POLSKAS, REELS, SEA SHANTIES, ONE ROOM — Skye Consort & Emma Björling

Wednesday, April 28 | 7:30 PM
The Monarch, Ogden
Tickets start at $25

A Skye Consort & Emma Björling concert in Ogden sounds like a secret the rest of the folk world already knows: Swedish polskas flowing into Celtic reels, a sea shanty that channels both Mumford & Sons and Philip Glass, and a voice so singular it reshapes every song it touches.

The group was born from a happy accident. In 2017, a cancelled flight stranded Swedish singer Emma Björling in Montréal alongside members of Skye Consort, a collective rooted in the early music world through their long collaboration with the Canadian ensemble La Nef. What started as an impromptu session grew into a full partnership, pulling songs and tunes from Sweden, Norway, Ireland, Scotland, England, Québec, and Acadia into arrangements that feel both ancient and entirely new.

Instrumentation includes:
- nyckelharpa (a Swedish keyed fiddle that looks like it walked out of a Renaissance workshop)
- cello
- bouzouki
- banjo
- shruti box
- layered vocals

Their self-titled debut won the OPUS Award for Album of the Year in the World Music and Traditional Québec Music categories. Their second record, Ode & Ballade (2024), explores medieval narratives, drinking songs, heartbreaking love songs, and celebrations of spring. The material is half original compositions and half traditional songs drawn from centuries of storytelling across two continents.

The Monarch's renovated industrial setting in Ogden's Nine Rails Creative District offers intimate sightlines and warm acoustics — a room where you hear the bow cross the strings and the breath before a note lands. If you were at Maeve Gilchrist, Twisted Pine, or Rakish and left wanting more of that feeling, this is your next night out.