Anders Wyller - God dag mitt barn [Good morning my child]

”God dag mitt barn” [Good morning my child]

Strindberg’s letters to his daughter become a pop album with great-grandchild Anders Wyller.

“Good morning, my child, may I ask you something? How are you going to cope?”

This is the start of the new album by Anders Wyller.

Anders is the great-grandchild of August Strindberg. His paternal grandmother was the outcome of a passionate encounter between the aging Strindberg and the 30 years younger Norwegian actress diva, Harriet Bosse. They had a child together before their brief marriage dissolved. This was just before Norway liberated itself from the union with Sweden. Strindberg wrote a number of letters to his child, and the child’s grandson, Anders Wyller, has now written songs based on elements from some of these letters.

This has now become the album “God dag mitt barn”, one of the most important releases by KKV this winter. The vocal tracks were recorded in Strindberg’s apartment on Drottninggatan in Stockholm, which has been preserved and later turned into a museum. The additional instrument tracks were added in Rainbow Studio in Oslo, led by Anders in collavoration with Sverre Thorstensen, who also plays the guitar, electric piano, organ and pedal organ on this production. Other musicians are Erland Dahlen (drums, percussion, saw), Julie Kleive (backup vocals), Torjus Eggen (bass), Sunniva Shaw (cello, backup vocals), Håkon Brunborg (viola, pedal steel), Magnus Tenge (guitars, lap steel) and Trygve Seim (saxophones).

Here is what Anders has to say about the project:

August Strindberg had more than a passing interest in writing letters. He wrote an estimated 15 000 letters, whereof 10 000 have been preserved and published in book form, comprising twenty volumes.

The little book ”God dag, mitt barn! Berättelsen om August Strindberg, Harriet Bosse och deras dotter Anne-Marie” [Good morning my child! The story of August Strindberg, Harriet Bosse and their daughter Anne-Marie] by Björn Meidal (Bonnier 2002) describes the encounter between the middle-aged August and the very much younger Harriet, at the start of the twentieth century. August had gone through a long personal crisis, described in his play “Inferno” – but had landed on his feet with his creativity intact, starting an extremely productive spurt at this stage of his life. Harriet Bosse, on the brink of her great breakthrough, was discovered by August when looking for an actress to play Damen (the Lady) in his play “Till Damaskus” [To Damascus].

The outcome of the explosively powerful love match is the child Anne-Marie, my paternal grandmother. She grew up in the crossfire between these great artists, these huge egos, and she lived through the history of the entire twentieth century.

Strindberg writes beautifully about the meetings with Harriet and writes wonderfully childishly and enthusiastically to Anne-Marie that she must never think of putting her weekly allowance into her piggybank, but rather buy something fun and great – like fireworks! The letters truly reveal a loving and caring author who, in the middle of his vast creative universe, also needs to be a quite common man and a quite common author.