Featuring Royal Swedish Opera Soloists
Saturday Aug 15, 6:30pm
at Lutheran Church of the Redeemer
731 Peachtree Street, Atlanta
Experience authentic Swedish choral music with Vasa Drängar, Atlanta’s Swedish men’s choir. Celebrating 30 years with guest soloists from the Royal Swedish Opera.
ANNIVERSARY CONCERT ON AUGUST 15TH, 2026
In the spring of 1996 a few guys, members of the Nordic Lodge in Atlanta, found out that among them were enough people to create a men’s double chorus. After a few more inquiries, we had a group of seven people. So, we got together and started practicing. It sounded promising, so we offered our services to the Nordic Lodge. They gave us our first gig: Their annual crawfish dinner, on September 14th 1996.
To celebrate our 30th anniversary, we have decided to present a concert, including old favorites and new great songs, and with soloists from Sweden. It is going to happen on Saturday August 15th, at a beautiful church in Atlanta’s Midtown, the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer, located at 731 Peachtree Street, Atlanta GA 30308 – opposite the Fox Theater. The concert will start at 6:30 pm.
We have invited two of Sweden’s best opera singers, Marcus Jupither and Niklas Björling Rygert from Stockholm. You may have met Niklas before, for instance at the AUSS Convention in 2023. On August 15th you will hear them in songs from La Boheme, Tosca and much more – by themselves and with the chorus.
Here follows a little about both of them, from their respective bios.
Marcus is one of Sweden’s foremost engaged singers of today with a repertoire of over 60 parts. He studied at the Royal University of Music and at the Opera Academy. He made his opera debut in 1995. He has performed at all major Swedish opera houses. He had a great success as the title role of Wozzeck at the Gothenburg Opera in 1999, that led him to his international debut which was in Prague. Since then, he has sung at numerous locations in Europe. In 2014 he made his debut in the United States in Il Trovatore, at Sacramento’s opera house. He has also directed operas. His first, and very much praised, was Das Rheingold at the outdoor arena Dalhalla in western Sweden. Marcus’ father, Rolf Jupither, was also an opera singer, at the Royal Opera in Stockholm. He was especially recognized for the role of Scarpia in Tosca – which now his son is mastering. In the 1970’s he was part of the New Björling Quartet.
Niklas is a graduate of the University College of Opera, in Stockholm. He is Sweden’s leading character tenor. He did his opera debut in 1994 and has been a member of the soloists’ ensemble at the Royal Opera in Stockholm since 1999. There he has sung over 50 roles in more than one thousand performances. He has, for instance, sung Monostatos in The Magic Flute 117 times – more than any of the 27 singers who have sung Monostatos at the Royal Opera since it opened in 1812. Niklas’ first was in September 2000 and latest in March of this year. For his Mime in Siegfried in 2006, he won the Opera Magazine’s prestigious Opera Prize. It brought him international attention and took him to Valencia, Spain, where he sang Mime in the Ring of Nibelungen in 2008 and 2009 under the baton of Zubin Mehta. He has been invited to sing in Norway, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Holland, Poland, Spain, Italy, Israel and the United States. Niklas’s daughter Kerstin Linden, 18 years old, is an actress, who among several other movies played Ronja in Astrid Lindgren’s Ronja Rövardotter.
The concert will be conducted by Paula Fagerberg, who also – in a few songs – will play the harp. Andrew Fazackerley on the piano, and his musicians on bass and percussion, will accompany. David Cooper will play on mandolin and balalaika. Even the church’s magnificent organ will be heard, played by Sarah Hawbecker.
Tickets are available at the Vasa Drängar website https://www.vasadrangar.com – which forwards to Eventbrite.
The prices are: Adults $30; seniors $25, students 20.
We recommend you to purchase tickets in advance rather than at the door, because the concert will probably be sold out.
Göran Rygert, Vasa Drängar, Atlanta.