Participants

• Per Sporrong, violin

• Karin Eriksson, violin

• Ulrika Edström, cello

  Ulrika Edström started playing violoncello in her youth, growing up in the United States. Her desire to play in an orchestra came when she was 10 years old and was overwhelmed by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra playing Mahler’s fifth symphony. Ultimately, after studying both in Sweden and abroad, she found her musical home in the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra where she has been the assistant principal since 1989.

  Besides playing with the SRSO, she is also active as a chamber musician with a particular interest in contemporary music. She has premiered chamber works by composers including Sven-David Sandstörm, Lars-Åke Franke-Blom, Oleg Gotskosik, and Jarosław Kapuściński. She also has a strong dedication to developing future generations of musicians through summer schools, various development projects in Switzerland, Mexico and South Africa, and through teaching at Lilla Akademien in Stockholm.

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• Johanna Sjunnesson, cello

  Since 1999, Johanna Sjunnesson has been a cellist with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, and she also comfortably ventures beyond the boundaries of orchestral music. As a soloist, she has performed at Berwaldhallen, the Concert Hall, Cirkus, and the Blue Hall, as well as at the Grammis Gala and the Polar Music Prize Banquet, where she has performed her own compositions.

  In her own compositions, Johanna is inspired by various genres, from baroque and classical music to ambient and electronica. Her music has been played on both radio and television, and in the fall of 2023, an album featuring music for solo cello and another in ambient style, recorded with Iceland-based Mikael Lind, will be released. Lind also participated in the EP ”Celistial” released in 2021, where Johanna interprets music by Marin Marais, Henry Purcell, and Johann Sebastian Bach, among others.

  Johanna Sjunnesson studied at the Royal College of Music with Elemér Lavotha, as well as abroad through several major scholarships.

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• Mats Wallin, clarinet

  Mats was born and raised in Stockholm and began his music studies at the municipal music school. After quite intensive freelancing during his years at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm, Mats worked in the Royal Swedish Orchestra from 1983 to 1986. Since 1986, he has been a clarinetist and bass clarinetist with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra. In addition to his involvement with Swedish Radio, he is active as a chamber musician in various settings, primarily with the contemporary music ensemble Sonanza, which was formed in 1982. He also teaches bass clarinet at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm.

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• Daniel Handsworth, bassoon

• Ulrik Nilsson, percussion

• Greta Gyraitė, postdoc at Vilnius University; researcher at Klaipėda University

• Åsa Callmer, postdoc at Örebro University

  Åsa Callmer is a post-doctoral researcher in environmental sociology at Örebro University. She is currently engaged in the research project (Un)sustainable lifestyles: social (im)possibilities to consume less, investigating different ways in which social relations may facilitate and/or hinder reduced consumption and sustainable lifestyle choices.

  Åsa’s research interests concern sustainable consumption, sufficiency, and planning for sustainable transitions. She is particularly interested in the formation of social norms, our understanding of limits and limitations, and the interplay of sustainability and justice issues in shaping sustainable futures. Her PhD thesis Making sense of sufficiency: Entries, practices and politics (KTH Royal Institute of Technology, 2019) deals with the idea, practices, and politics of sufficiency in an affluent consumerist society.

   

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• Emilia Witkowska Nery, postdoc at the Polish Academy of Sciences

  Emilia Witkowska Nery is an analytical chemist passionate about biology and engineering. Her research topics stretch from easy sensors, which can be fabricated in resource-limited settings and used by untrained individuals, to smart sensing systems called electronic tongues that can analyze complex samples (body fluids, cell cultures, bioprocesses and environmental monitoring). She graduated from Warsaw University of Technology, Poland and did her PhD at the University of Campinas in Brazil. Now, she is leading the Sensor Arrays group at the Institute of Physical Chemistry Polish Academy of Sciences (sensorarrays.com.pl).

  ”The work of a scientist is very similar to that of an artist. We develop our manual skills and techniques in the laboratory, spend hours discovering what people did before us and need creativity to think of something new. I hope that, through interactions with other creative minds at Science Lab of the Baltic Sea Festival, I can look at my work from another perspective and maybe discover some new angle.”

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• Natasja Börjeson, postdoc at Stockholm University

  My current research aims to understand the opportunities and challenges of managing chemical risks. It focuses on how regulation and policy can enable a non-toxic circular society and how societal actors take responsibility for managing chemical risks in everyday products. Areas of interest are environmental governance and the structures, processes, rules and norms that shape society and how actors participate and influence decision-making. Particular attention is paid to chemical risk governance, supply chain management, and the trade-offs and synergies that arise in the transition to sustainable resource use. I strive to integrate societal actors in my teaching and value the collaborative research approach.

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• Isolde Puts, postdoc at Umeå University

  Did you know that land and water are connected? Rivers collect substances that are stored in the landscape and that are added by humans and transport it to the Baltic Sea. These substances affect life in the water. I am an early-career researcher, with the aim to understand how global changes affect coastal ecology and the quality of natural marine resources, including the Baltic Sea. I am located in Umeå (Sweden), and closely collaborate with researchers from Sweden, Denmark, Greenland, Iceland, and Norway to compare the functioning of these natural systems. In my free time I play violin. To play music, or to do research, you have to listen and observe very well. There is something magical about making music or do research together, and I can’t wait to see what happens when we combine both.

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• Robin Bonné, postdoc at Aarhus University

  Robin Bonné (BE, 31) is a postdoc at Aarhus University who fell in love with cable bacteria: long wire-like microbes that conduct electricity just like a copper wire. In the last 5 years, he investigated how these bacteria conduct electricity and what we can learn from them to make our electronics eco-friendlier.

  Besides that, Robin has a continuous drive for science communication. This led him to start his own company ‘Robin Talks Science’, where he supports researchers in their outreach activities and citizen science projects. In his free time, you will find him behind a musical instrument, playing improvisation theatre or on a long hike in the forest.

  ”About 10 years ago in Aarhus, a microbe was discovered that made us rewrite our biology textbooks: cable bacteria. These creatures conducts electricity just like an electric wire, in the mud of the Baltic Sea and beyond. Like many researchers working with cable bacteria, I fell in love with these unique lifeforms and want to share their story with the world. Having a personal passion for music and science communication, I’m thrilled that cable bacteria will soon be able to listen to their own song.”

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• Elisabet Ljungar, director

  Elisabet Ljungar graduated in theatre direction and violin studies. She has broad experience with various types of music, from the Baroque era to new works within opera, musicals, cabaret and spoken drama. She has worked with the Royal Swedish Opera, Göteborgsoperan, Norrlandsoperan, Värmlandsoperan, Malmö Opera, Nordnorsk Opera as well as the Stockholm and Borås city theatres. With her deep musical knowledge and expertise, she enjoys producing new music. One example is Mats Larsson Gothe’s opera about Marie Curie, Blanche och Marie, for Norrlandsoperan in 2014, nominated for best new opera in the world.

  Between 2001 and 2012, Ljungar founded and was creative director of the chamber opera company TeaterTravers, dedicated to bringing musical drama to a wider audience. Between 2015 and 2023, she was musical director and artistic director at Norrlandsoperan, and after that Nordiska Kammarorkestern, Sundsvall.

  Elisabet Ljungar is also a dramaturg, and she writes and translates libretti and plays. She is a member of the Writers Guild of Sweden.

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