Metal Pipes

Organist Gunnar Idenstam is well known for reinventing the organ repertoire, often through genre-crossing projects where Baroque music is woven together with Swedish folk traditions – as in his collaborations with violinist Lisa Rydberg and nyckelharpa player Erik Rydvall.

Metal Pipes reveals a different side of the multifaceted Gunnar Idenstam.

“The concert is like a story,” says Idenstam. “It all began when I was 12 and heard Skäggmanslaget together with the rock group Contact in the song Hon kom över mon (She Came Over the Moor). Somewhere deep inside, I knew that one day I would bring together the organ, folk music and rock.”

In Metal Pipes, Konserthuset’s monumental organ, with its 6,100 pipes, steps into the world of rock. Joining Idenstam are Joacim Cans – lead singer of the heavy metal band HammerFall and known to a wide audience from appearances in Körslaget, the musical Rock of Ages, and Melodifestivalen – guitarist Marcus Jidell from the doom metal band Avatarium, bassist Andreas Passmark of the Danish metal band Royal Hunt, and percussionist Jonas Sjöblom, known for his many collaborations with choreographer Virpi Pahkinen.

“In Metal Pipes, we pay tribute to several of the great rock bands – including Judas Priest, Procol Harum, Gary Moore, Iron Maiden and Europe. Some pieces are instrumental, others feature vocals. We’ll also perform rock versions from my project Metal Angel.” (On the 2020 album Metal Angel, Idenstam created a symphonic suite about angels in a Gothic fantasy world, where metal and rock meet the traditions of French cathedral music.)