Vesterheim Museum's Black Fiddle

Location: 523 West Water Street, Decorah, Iowa 

https://vesterheim.org/

The Vesterheim Museum does Charge for Admission, Visit for the Website Above for Pricing

The Black Fiddle, also known as Svartefela - its name alone is enough to send shivers down your spine! But its true power extends far beyond your little bones. It all started in the early 1800s, when Reve-Søren, the best fiddle maker in his village, was approached by a strange visitor at his workshop in Vest-Agder, Norway. The stranger offered instrument-grade wood, which was hard to come by at the time due to the raging Norwegian War of Independence. Reve-Søren accepted the material, but dyed it a dark color to disguise its “inferior quality.” The fiddle became a loaner instrument, often played at outdoor weddings. However, it soon developed a notorious reputation for turning a happy event into a violent one. Each time the fiddle was played, fights broke out in the crowd and the violinist was attacked! At one wedding, fiddler Nils Stubstad was trampled by a belligerent audience upon playing Svartefela. Stubstad died three days later, and the fiddle, trampled with its player in the skirmish, went missing. It turned back up in 2008, where it was uncovered that Stubtad’s brother had gained possession of and restored the instrument. Perhaps upon being broken and put back together, whatever evil power lurked within the fiddle was lessened, because the fiddle has played since with “no major incident” (Vesterheim). 

Violin and Hardingfele player Eden Ehm played the Black Fiddle in a performance on October 4th of 2024. Knowing the fiddle’s history well, she was relieved to find that its vibes were “remarkably neutral.” Perhaps this can be attributed to Ehm’s careful intentions while playing, which included being knowledgeable and respectful of the fiddle’s background, as well as playing music only from the fiddle’s home of Vest-Agder. Still, the performance did not occur without strangeness. Ehm, who only had three-days notice to prepare for the performance given that the original performers had unexpected travel and health issues, noticed that the fiddle had a “really bad audible buzz” at first, which can occur for stringed instruments when they haven’t been played in a while. Though a luthier is normally required to fix this problem, the Black Fiddle seems to have righted itself, with the buzz disappearing entirely by the end of the performance. Ehm took this as a sign that the fiddle was happy to be played once again. To hear Eden Ehm playing the Black Fiddle, visit this link.

The story of an instrument with supernatural power is not exclusive to the Black Fiddle. Grimm’s Fairy Tales tell the story of “The Singing Bone”, in which a flute made from the bone of a murdered man sings the tale of his death. In a Jewish folktale titled “The Haunted Violin”, a fiddle maker is killed by the power of a vengeful violin after carving it from coffin wood. Music is a foundational, integral part of almost all known cultures of our world. As a common thread throughout history, it is expected and only natural that musical instruments, like the fiddle, have been weirdified and mystified by folklore and haunting stories. Fable or truth, the Black Fiddle carries with it strangeness and a dark past. The next time you get invited to a wedding in Decorah, be sure to look into what instrument is providing accompaniment - you could be in for an exciting event!