You Are Skalds Already

Song Background/Inspiration

A Nordic folk chant in adapted drott-kvaett - the six-syllable, three-stress meter of the Viking court poets - written in praise of the Festival of Skalds in Angora, Minnesota. The first verse teaches what a skald was: the keeper of a people's memory, whose songs kept the honored dead alive. The middle verses walk the festival grounds past the archery range, the axe throw, the forges, the minstrels, dancers, fire-spinner, and dragon hunters in training, and the bridge hands the tradition to the listener: keep the stories, and you are a skald already.