Julane Lund (previously known as Julane Beetham) performs Norwegian and Norwegian-American traditional music on both the conventional violin as well as the Norwegian Hardanger fiddle.  

 

Julane has toured throughout many countries in both Western and Eastern Europe, the United States, Canada, and in the Russian Republic of Bashkortostan.  She has been featured on several television and radio programs in these countries.  

 

 

Her family on her mother's side came from Gudbrandsdalen, Norway and settled in North Dakota.  It was there that her grandfather, Gehart Lund, played fiddle for barn dances and house parties.  Julane was born in Wisconsin, and as a child, she moved with her family to Indiana where she studied classical violin at Ball State University and played violin in the Indianapolis Philharmonic Orchestra.  Later, she studied ethnomusicology in the graduate program at Indiana University.

 

Having been influenced by her grandfather's fiddling, she moved to Telemark, Norway in 2001.  Through the Institute for Folk Culture at Telemark University College, Julane was immersed in the traditional fiddling styles of both Hardanger fiddle and regular fiddle. 

 

Julane has both a second bachelors degree in traditional music (focusing on fiddle performance) and a masters degree in traditional music from Telemark University College.  This masters degree was the first such offered for traditional music in all of Norway.  Articles about Julane have been found on the front page of the Telemark state newspaper, Telemarksavisen, as well as in the Norwegian national folk music magazine, Spelemannsbladet. 

 

 Julane in Slovakia with teacher & friend Ånon Egeland

 

Oral tradition plays a large part in how Julane learns music, and her teachers have been some of the finest fiddlers in Norway and in the U.S.  She has studied extensively with Ånon Egeland, her teacher at Telemark University College.  She has also learned tunes from Per Sæmund Bjørkum, of Gudbrandsdalen.  American fiddlers who Julane has learned tunes from are: Tip Bagstad (Wisconsin), Beth Hoven Rotto (Iowa), Lloyd Larson (North Dakota), and Harold Sorenson (Minnesota). 

 

Regarding Hardanger fiddle, Julane has studied several years with Setesdal native Vidar Lande as well as having learned tunes from Tarje Kristian Hansen (Telemark), Frank Rolland (Hardanger), and Erling Kroken (west coast).  American teachers have been Loretta Kelley (Washington D.C. area), Andrea Een (Minnesota), and Harold Sorenson.

 

Julane promotes Norwegian-American music as a distinct genre.  In 2003 she performed Hardanger fiddle with the Republic of Bashkortostan's Folk Instrument Orchestra.  In 2004 Julane was featured on the Norwegian CD "Fest på låven!" (Party at the Barn!) as a soloist playing Norwegian-American music.  

 

In the autumn of 2006 Julane released her first solo CD called "Looking Back at Norwegian-American Old-time Fiddling in the Heartland."  This CD is Julane's tribute to Norwegian-American fiddlers who have lived in the Upper Midwest.

 

Julane is the current Indiana state champion of the Traditional Arts Indiana fiddle contest. Held annually at the Indiana State Fair, fiddlers from across the state (and some from outside the state) compete.  She is a member of the Hardanger Fiddle Association of America as well as the National Old Time Fiddler's Association.