I had purchased their album Kära Mor (Dearest Mom) many moons ago at a second-hand shop, in San Francisco, California. I fell for it immediately. The music is both comforting and enchanting. All songs are in Swedish but the sweetness is sublime. In 2001 the CD Musik vi minns... Göingeflickorna 1961-1975 was released but I've yet to see it state side. After a seaching for info about them in hopes of getting a chance to release their recordings - on the noise/grind/punk/??? label enterruption - a Swedish newspaper forwarded me a contact whom I wrote to. To my surprise, I recieved a pacakage from Sonja (December 2001) - The Göinge Girls: Sonja, Barbro and Agneta sent me an autographed copy!

I felt extremely honored that Sonja had taken the time and effort to translate and type the text presentation and the lyrics of Kära Mor.

Dear Sonja, Barbro and Agneta...

Tack så mycket.

Sincerely,

Eriijk

"The Göinge Girls have been called the world's oldest girl band and in 2001 they actually celebrated their forty-year anniversary as recording artists. Their first appearance, however, took place already in 1955 in their home village Boalt, a few miles east of Osby in northern Scania. The Norén sisters, Sonja (b.1934), Barbro (b. 1941) and Agneta (b. 1945), grew up in a musical building worker's family. They felt at home on the stage and dreamt of becoming, with swing and bop, Scania's answer to the Harmony Sisters. Under the stage name of `The Norén Sisters' they sang at local entertainments and parties. The author Thor Brogårdh persuaded them to make a larger appearance in 1958 in Malmö. On his advice they sang under the the new name of `The Göinge Girls', dressed in the traditional dress of the district of Eastern Göinge. The trio then took part in the Sigge Fürst's `Breakfast Club' on the wireless. The record company man Simon Brehm, who smelled success, at once made a contract with the sisters. He firmly believed in `Kära Mor' (`Dearest Mom'), but his new artists considered it too sentimental. But Simon insisted and the record came out in 1961 just in time for Mother's Day. The producers at Sweden's Radio turned out to feel the same about `Kära Mor' as the singers themselves, but after Radio Nord had started to play the record it could be heard also on the national broadcasting programs. `Kära Mor' was sold in 250,000 copies and complete success was a fact. The record was even played in Australia and was latter appreciated as a lullaby in Gambia after appearing on West African programs. The Pop Ten of the Swedish tabloid Expressen listed the song as the greatest Swedish hit of 1961. In the summer the Göinge Girls made their first folk park tour with the same accompaniment as now: guitar, bass and zither. Old attendance records were beaten again and again, and many of the sisters' attendances lasted up to the 1980's. The TV debut took place in Denmark, and after that the Göinge Girls were guest visitors on several German and Finnish programs as well as on popular Swedish programs like `Hyland's Corner'. They sang about red cottages, blue lakes and deep forests, about longing, deceit and regrets and not least about love for mother. "The Swedes salted their coffee with tears", one columnist wrote. In 1967 the sisters went to the U.S. for a tour in the Swedish settlements. The Göinge Girls have always been close to their audience and belong to that category of popular entertainers who are expected to sit down at the coffee table after the show.

The 1960's were filled with recordings and tours all over Scandinavia. Apart from engagements on weekdays, 8-10 extra appearances during weekends was the rule, with rarely less than 250 appearances in the summer. Even if the pace slowed down in the 1970's and 1980's, they were still in great demand. In 1978 they answered letter no. 10,000. In 1988 their fifth set of traditional dresses was worn out, and in 1995 they had sung `Kära Mor' over 15,000 times. after some 15 years Barbo had backed out to appear instead with her husband, the dance musician Lars Svensson, as the duet `Barbro & Lars', but there was no split at all behind this. Sonja and Agneta continued on their own up to Lucia Day in 1995 when they made a final appearance in Höör in Scania. Six silent years have gone, but in time for the forty-year anniversary the Göinge Girls were reunited in front of an enthusiastic audience. Their repertoire consists of 250 tunes - about 247 more than for most of today's hottest artists... Someone once described the Göinge Girls as "a rocket that was launched with much brouhaha in order then to settle down and circle in a safe orbit". May they circle for a long time yet, for artists like the Göinge Girls are needed in time when supply is bigger than ever but variation too often missing... On their reunion they excused themselves saying "It will only be the old tunes!" That is actually quite a lot."

Anders Elderman, Stockholm, January 2001