Expat Estonian folksinger Reet Hendrikson remembered in Tallinn – July 1, 2014 Andres Raudsepp article

A July 1, 2014 estonianworld.com article by Andres Raudsepp is entitled: “Enigmatic expat folksinger Reet Hendrikson remembered in Tallinn (video).”

I enjoyed the article. I met Reet Hendrikson many years ago. I did not know the details of her life, until I read this great article. I look forward to buying her CDs.

Opening paragraphs read:

Like bees flying back to their hive, a large number of global Estonians will be returning to Estonia on the occasion of the 26th National Song and Dance Festival held in Tallinn from 4-6 July [2014]. One of the most global of Estonians, folksinger Reet Hendrikson, will be there in memory only, at a musical tribute at the Museum of Occupations on 1 July.

In the atmosphere of a huge celebration that brings together more than 20,000 singers and 200,000 listeners (if you leave out the masses of folk dancers), such a tribute may represent only a few quarter-notes in a symphony, but it completes the musical creation. The story of Hendrikson may also be a signal to the bees or a distant herder’s call to return from pasture.

Reet Hendrikson was born in Estonia only months before the “great escape” into exile in 1944. Brought up and educated in Sweden, she went to study in the US in 1967 on a Fulbright scholarship, before she made her mark as an Estonian musician in Canada. While her arrangements of Estonian folksongs on the guitar reflected the styles of the sixties, her voice and choice of material sounded authentic and made a connection with ages past.

Somehow her personal contacts from long ago as well as her music studies in Europe have reached a new generation. This is now opening up a new page in the retelling of her life.

[End of excerpt]

Tartu College (Toronto)

On Oct. 26, 2016 at 7:00 pm, Andres Raudsepp will lead a celebration at Tartu College of Reet Hendrikson’s life and music. The event will be conducted in Estonian.

I learned of the event from an email newsletter from VEMU, the Museum of Estonians Abroad – “Where Our History Lives On.”