Listen:
Vindmøller
Den Danske Sang...
Gæstebud
Lysets Engel

The musicians:
Harald Haugaard (violin, viola), Morten Alfred Høirup (guitars), Tapani Varis (double bass, flutes & jews harps), Karen Tweed (piano accordion), Ruthie Dornfeld (violin), Eileen Ivers (violin), Hans Jørgen Christensen (violin), Niall Keegan (flute), Carl Erik Lundgaard (diatonic accordion), Karen Mose & Helene Blum (vocals), Sofia Karlsson (vocals), Channe Nussbaum (vocals), Helen Davies (celtic harp), Ale Möller (harmonica, mandola & bombarde), Alasdair Fraser & Natalie Haas (violin & cello), Le Vent du Nord: Benoit Bourque (diatonic accordion, step dance, vocals), Olivier Demers (violin, feet, vocals), Simon Beaudry (guitar) & Nicolas Boulerice (hurdy-gurdy, snere & vocals).

See more recordings by the duo

Track listing and press info:

track
1. Vindmøller (Traditional Danish/Haugaard & Høirup)
Harald Haugaard: Violin
Morten Alfred Høirup: Guitar (DADF#AD)
Ale Møller: Harmonica, Mandola, Bombarde

2. Den Danske Sang er en Ung Blond Pige (Kai Hoffmann/Carl Nielsen)
Harald Haugaard: Violin, Viola
Morten Alfred Høirup: Guitar (DADF#AD)
Sofia Karlsson: Vocals
Tapani Varis: Selje-flute, Bamboo Flute, Kantele, Double Bass

Feast is a celebration of friendship, of people Harald Haugaard and Morten Alfred Høirup have met as they've played all over the world. After four albums together they wanted to do something different, and this idea, which had been brewing for a long time, finally came to fruition. "This has been our dream for years," says Harald. "I remember driving around in Germany and talking about it, how it's always fun to work in a duo, but also how it would be great to meet some of our friends and create an album. But we never expected it would really happen. From the first thought it's taken us four, maybe five years to get here. We wanted to make an album with friends and colleagues we've played with or taught with, people with whom we have a connection."
Although, as Morten explains, "the idea of playing Danish music with these people was basically to explore new possibilities, try a new sound and have good fun together," there was also a deeper underlying purpose. "We were thinking how good it would be for our Danish audience to hear that great musicians from other countries actually thought that this music was worth playing. We admire these people for their music and their attitude, and we want to thank them for their open minds and their great skill. I think we've all made a beautiful and unique musical sculpture together."
The music would all be Danish, and mostly traditional, taking many of the guests out of their comfort zones, although, Harald adds, "We've picked the tunes for the people we worked with, tried to fit them together."
It's Danish music, but with a decidedly global perspective. The musicians are from all over, the demos made in hotel rooms and cramped backstage areas in different places around the world, then e-mailed to the participants, and the sessions themselves took place in locations as varied as New York City, Montréal, Glasgow, and Odense in Denmark.
"The whole thing was a case of shooting from the hip," Morten admits. "We roughly knew the tunes and we went into the studio to see if we could work together. We'd done workshops with these people, or played festival finales with them, but with a few exceptions we'd never really played music together. In fact several of the musicians had never actually met before they started recording together on this project. But we all had a great time and each experience was fantastic, it was worth it. All these people came in without a safety net, playing music that wasn't their speciality. The spontaneity and their fantastic musical abilities is what you hear."
"When the musicians came to the studio, none of them had any idea what to expect or what to do," Harald recalls. "and often we didn't know exactly how to do it, either! For most of them Danish music was something new. Of course we had ideas, but most of the music was arranged and recorded very live. The spirit all the way through is 'Hey, how are you doing? Let's make some music.' Simple is beautiful, and this is a beautifully simple idea."
Whilst most of the tracks have guests, there are two cuts, Danmarks Ældste Polka and den Sødeste Vals that were quite deliberately left at just Haugaard and Høirup's fiddle and guitar.
"For a lot of people this might be the first time they hear us, so we thought it is only fair they had a chance to hear just us and how we are," Morten explains. "Also they were tunes we really wanted to record." But even there they challenged themselves. "We knew the tunes, but we'd never played them together before we went in the studio. And when you listen to them compared to the bigger bands it gives a perspective to the whole thing."
Now it's complete, both Harald and Morten are proud of what they've created with Feast. The work of the last few years has paid off in ways they couldn't even imagine when they began.
"I'm very happy with it," says Morten contentedly. "Together we created something new and completely different, and we sincerely hope our audience will enjoy listening to this music as much as we've all enjoyed creating it."