Lars Karlsson - biography
Lars Karlsson was born in Fjärås, Sweden on April 16th, 1971. Both his mother Siv and his father Ingvar play the accordion and also his grandfather Karl was a musician. He started to play the diatonic accordion at the age of 10 and after a little more than a year he had both been in TV and on LP/cassette. After this Lars has been in nationwide Television many times, he has made many performances in local TV-shows and a lot of radio appearances.
Lars won some diatonic contests in the 80´s and in 1993 he won the senior class in the Nordic Championships in diatonic accordions (in competition with participants from Sweden, Norway, Finland and Holland). The last years he has been a judge in accordion competitions in both Sweden and Norway.
In 1995 he received his community´s culture prize. The first accordionist ever to get this. The same year he performed at the gala concert in Coupe Mondiale (world championships).
Lars made his first own recording, the cassette ”Julifröjd” in 1990. In 1993 he made the CD ”Lufsen”. During the same year he met the Norwegian diatonic champion Bjørnar Haugen, they made the CD ”Durspelsduell” the year after. In 1996 Lars made the CD ”Inspiration” which really got great attention and truly became a mark in the diatonic´s history. On this CD different styles as polka, schottis, swing, cajun, march and others were mixed and in fact also a ”funeral anthem”. After the ”Inspiration”-CD was released it resulted in a large number of TV appearances. The CD “Lars Karlsson Band” was released in 1998, the most variated accordion-CD ever made in Sweden. This CD includes ”Pizza-Shuffle” that was on ”Svensktoppen” (Swedish top chart list) for 3 weeks (highest position 6th place)! First time ever an instrumental diatonic melody on this Swedish top list. In 1999 Lars made the CD ”Min Tös” together with accordionist Anders Larsson which is a CD more in the traditional style. In 2000 the collection CD ”1983 - 1993” was released.
In June 2002 Lars Karlsson Band releast their second CD ”2002” with a couple of TV performances around it. In October this year the melody ”Vandringsvisa” from this also entered the ”Svensktoppen” chart list, voted by radio listeners all over Sweden.
Lars is touring and performing a lot around in Northern Europe. Both with ”Lars Karlsson Band”, as a solo artist or together with top accordionists as Bengan Janson, Pierre Eriksson, Jörgen Sundeqvist, Øivind Farmen, Bernt Andersson, Mats Edén, Anders Larsson, Bjørnar Haugen and others.
During 2001 and 2003 Lars made smaller tours in the United States.
Swedish Accordion Championships was in Kramfors 2001 and there he was one of the judges in different classes. He was also one of the judges in the Norwegian Accordion Championships 2002.
Lars has also workshops for diatonic accordion in Sweden & Norway and in 2003 he held a workshop in Holland together with diatonic accordion teachers from Ireland, France, Italy etc.
In May 2004 the original performace of the new “Church mass for diatonic accordion, church choir, string quartet and percussion” was held in the church of Fjärås, a work composed by Lars.
In September 2004 Lars Karlsson Duo performed on a big festival in North Dakota, USA.
Lars Karlsson is also a bass player and has performed in several blues and rock groups. His repertoare is very mixed, from traditional accordion music / folklore music, swing, tango, march music etc to stiles like blues, rock & cajun.
Lars´ melodies are also played a lot by other accordionists and diatonic accordionists. One example is when the 17 years old Kristin Verket became Norwegian Champion in 1996 when she competed with 3 melodies made by Lars Karlsson. In 1998 he was elected in the organisation SKAP (”The Swedish Society of Popular Music Composers”). He received the SKAP award in 2001 (together with Björn Ulvaeus, Meja, Alice Babs, Eagle-Eye Cherry a o).
When Lars is not performing he works with accordion service & sales and he has also been in Italy and developed diatonic and accordion models.
In December 2001 Lars Karlsson was by the members of the Swedish Accordionists
Assossiation voted to ”Accordionist of the Year”, a diatonic
accordionist for the first time ever.
E-mail: lars.karlsson@karlssonsmusik.se
Hemsida: www.karlssonsmusik.se/larskarlsson.html
Contact
Lars Karlsson
E-mail:
lars@karlssonsmusik.se
Web site: www.karlssonsmusik.se/
larskarlsson.html
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