The Finnish American Folk School (FAFS) at Finlandia University was founded in 2017 to promote knowledge of Finnish folk arts and traditional skills and ensure that they thrive for generations to come. The Folk School is based in the Jutila Center Fiber Studio and the Finnish American Heritage Center in Hancock, Michigan. Classes, workshops, and performances are scheduled throughout the year, with many activities centered around the Copper Country’s Finnish festivals: Heikinpäivä (January), Juhannus/Midsummer (June), and Ruska (September).
We welcome workshop requests or proposals. Scholarships or assistantships are available. Please contact FAFS director Phyllis Fredendall with all questions, suggestions, or scholarship requests: phyllis.fredendall@finlandia.edu. To register please use the online registration link in each class description or call the Finnish American Heritage Center at 906-487-7549.
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2022 Program Schedule – COMING SOON
Please Note: All FAFS students are required to wear a proper mask for all Folk School classes and events, regardless of vaccination status.
Laurel Premo
January 29, 2022 – Workshop + Concert
The FAFS will welcome musician Laurel Premo to Hancock January 29, 2022. More details about her public workshop and performance will be available soon. Premo is known for her rhythmically deep and rapt delivery of roots music, spanning the crossover of old-time and bluesy American traditions to darker Scandinavian sounds. Her solo performances dive deep into traditional and new fiddle music, presented on finger-style electric guitar, lap steel, and voice, musically revealing a bloom of underlying harmonic drones, minimalist repetition, and rich polyrhythms. She is a Michigan-based artist first introduced to folk music and traditional dance by her parents Bette & Dean Premo and later mentored by Joel Mabus (clawhammer banjo, Michigan), Arto Järvelä (fiddle, Finland), and Ånon Egeland (fiddle, Norway). Working with Nordic master musicians as an adult both anchored and honed artistic expression that was cultivated as she was raised in the folk culture of the Upper Midwest.
Fall 2021 Classes + Workshops
Inkle Weaving
Beginning Weaving
Weavers’ Open Studio
Dye Studio Foundations
Beginning Spinning
5-String Kantele for Beginners
Jouhikko for Beginners Online
Colorwork Knitting
Patchwork Birchbark Sewing Kit
Wool Feltmaking
Nordic Wood Shaving Ornaments
Beginning Broom Making