Gilead – Villeman og Magnhild (Thousand Times 2015)

Villeman Og Magnhild (from Norwegian “Villeman and Magnhild”) is a folk song popular among Norse Vikings. It is a marching and rowing song traditionally sung by tough bearded Viking men who were crossing the sea on ominous drakkars. Actually, a certain performance (approved in the modern folk environment) exudes North severity and Nordic pathos. It’s all about specific stanzas’ structure, where the 2nd and the 4th stanzas repeat continuously and the composition acquires a kind of “marching colour”. Initially, the lyrics of “Villeman” were written down by Norwegian folklorist Moltke Moe in the 1920s and were published in the book “Norske Folkevisor”. The ballad itself tells us about a girl Magnhild and her grief: she believed that she was destined to drown in a river. Her fiancé, Villeman, tried to prove that the river was not a threat to her and that’s why he built a big and sturdy bridge. Having gathered local folk, he decided to take Magnhild across the bridge. Although, his horse stumbled on th