On Wednesday you'll be thanking me for introducing you to ANOTHER amazing singer from Sweden: Cecilia Nilsson, a.k.a Cissi or "See See"; Cecilia will sing two songs LIVE on Radio P4 Gavleborg on Friday at 15:30; @CissiNilssonn, @andreasjismark, #inmyroom

Cecilia Nilsson YouTube Channel video: 50 seconds of Cecilia Nilsson singing her first single, "In My Room." Uploaded May 10, 2013. http://youtu.be/0SjBQnl1FNU
Written by Cecilia Nilsson & Andreas Mattsson

Sunday brought some very positive and interesting news from Sweden concerning a Friend of the Blog, Andreas Jismark, 
So good, in fact, that he also shared the news via his Twitter feed, shown below.

The good news concerns a very talented young female singer from Gävle who's part of his talented music stable, and whose first single will officially be released on Wednesday.

To prime the public interest in her, Andreas has teased us, Sweden and the larger world with a clip featuring some of the first single. 
Not too much, lest we get a sugar rush or brain freeze, but just enough to give us a taste and keep us interested in seeing how the story ends on onsdag, Wednesday.
Mañana!

Andreas wrote...

youtube.com/watch?v=0SjBQn…Framtiden är Cissis! På onsdag kommer singeln, här är 50 sekunder!
— Andreas Jismark (@andreasjismark) May 12, 2013

This bit of news follows closely on the heels of the blog post that Andreas had written back on April 29th titled, quite cleverly, Goodbye, See See, Hello Cecilia Nilsson, which detailed some of the very hard work over the past two years that she's put in to make this moment possible.
http://andreasjismark.se/goodbye-see-see-hello-cecilia-nilsson/

Last Fall, some months before I traveled to Stockholm in January and met with Andreas and another great music talent whom he manages, the amazing Anni Bernhard, i.e Full of Keys, whom you'll be hearing more about in the coming days here at the blog, I'd watched this video of Cecilia quite a number of times, since by now you all know how much I love context.
I was looking for clues and hints of things to come.

As it happens, the video is in Swedish, but I still think you'll enjoy it as she speaks about herself and her music interests and desire to write songs that are honest and that will connect with people.

It was recorded mostly at her home in Gävle, a very middle-class Swedish city in the best possible sense of the word, and one that I've written about a few times here in the past, which has not always had the easiest go of things.

Just like growing-up or living in Baltimore or Pittsburgh or Indianapolis makes you a little more in-touch with the rest of the country than would be true in Santa Monica or Bethesda or Brookline, her town is a much-more accurate barometer of daily life in Sweden than many of the sweet upscale neighborhoods in Stockholm that I spent a lot of time in back in January.

Places where money and some degree of influence often helps keep some social problems at bay a little bit longer than it does in Gävle, where you take life as it is.

To me, at least, that means that any songs Cecilia writes and sings will be much more in-tune with the average listener's personal experiences than if she'd been born or raised in Södermalm, and had parents who pushed her around in one of those amazing $800-plus German prams they sell at Nordiska Kompaniet, which I spent some time eye-balling on my last day in Stockholm.

That came after I'd spent time walking at night from my hotel, The Omena in Norrmalm, down to the Royal Palace and then headed back to the hotel via the Kungsträdgården ice skating rink one last time and then the central downtown business district.

NK has an entire area of the store on the 4th Floor not just dedicated to upscale Kids, but to what seemed to be designer baby strollers, complete with a video showing German soccer Moms putting them thru their paces in Frankfurt.

(And do the well-educated Moms ever love to show those prams and their babies off at their nearby coffee shops! Or even the "Social Media" McDonalds I was at.
That is a whole 'nother blog post entirely -upscale Swedish soccer Moms!
They were everywhere! 
Not that I was complaining. )

And, now that it occurs to me, this film was recorded back when Cecilia's hair was much-longer than it currently is, which I know causes her some small distress, something I know about and recognize from having grown-up with two attractive younger sisters with beautiful long hair.


Andreas Jismark YouTube Channel video: See See (Presentation). Uploaded September 5, 2012. http://youtu.be/0syxcoAblN8

Some of Cecilia's hard work and preparation came just a few weeks ago when she spent some time over in Gotland, where Andreas lives, where she rehearsed and even performed at Hammersmith Odeon Visby, which you'll recall is also where Anni/Full of Keys performed, as I mentioned here on the blog at the time.

There was a nice article on Cecilia that appeared in one of the local Gotland papers at the time of her trip and it includes a nice photo of her and the band rehearsing, including Andreas on guitar, which Cecilia also plays.

Stjärnskott i Visby i helgen (Shooting stars in Visby this weekend)
http://www.helagotland.se/nyheter/artikel.aspx?articleid=8210085

One of the quotes I love is where Andreas, a music veteran in all sorts of important ways -as a performer, teacher, promoter, producer and manager- says the following:

– Jag har aldrig stött på en elev som ens är 30-40 procent så bra som Cissi, säger han.

which means that he's never worked with anyone who has even 30-40% of Cissi's natural singing talent and ability, which is really quite something to say for this lover of all things Depeche Mode.

The article headline is a reference to Cecilia being a "shooting star" and encouraging people to come and see her perform now while they can in such an intimate atmosphere, before she hits it big in show biz.

Here's another photo of her and the band rehearsing that same day that's on her Facebook page
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=151245411721188&set=a.151245378387858.1073741830.149873478525048&type=1&theater
and later at Hammersmith's:
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=151245571721172&set=a.151245378387858.1073741830.149873478525048&type=1&theater

I last mentioned Cecilia Nilsson -a.k.a. Cissi or "See See"- in my April 9, 2013 blog post titled, If Miriam Bryant isn't on your musical radar yet, she ought to be ;)  Miriam Bryant - Push Play (Official), Finders Keeper (Official); @MiriamBryant
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2013/04/if-miriam-bryant-isnt-on-your-musical.html
wherein I wrote:

Miriam, from Göthenberg, had a gig on Friday in Tranås at Babar, as did another young singing dynamo from Gävle I've been keeping close tabs on by the name of See See -a.k.a. Cissi Nilsson- pictured below, whom I'll be writing about in more detail soon.So much sheer musical talent in Sweden, it's hard to believe sometimes! 

Grymma gig i Tranås igår! #seeseesweden #MiriamBryant twitter.com/andreasjismark…
— Andreas Jismark (@andreasjismark) April 6, 2013

Andreas was actually able to record one of the songs Cecilia performed in Tranås at Babar before Miriam came onstage to perform later, and it's a tune some of you might recognize:


Andreas Jismark YouTube Channel video: Cecilia Nilsson "Never Let You Go" -LIVE at Babar in Tranås, Sweden. April 5, 2013. Uploaded April 6, 2013.
http://youtu.be/xVmsUZCpJqI


Here's a nice newspaper article on Cecilia that ran on Friday in her local newspaper, Arbetarbladet, which has done quite a number of stories on her over the past few years as she's sung and performed at many events all over the area, and developed quite a great reputation with a killer voice:
Hur känns det att släppa en singel? (How do you feel about your first single coming out?)
http://arbetarbladet.se/noje/musik/1.5861796-hur-kanns-det-att-slappa-en-singel-

Friday, Fredag, Friday, Fredag...
For those of you reading this in Sweden -or elsewhere, but who want to check her out via the Internet- Cecilia will be performing two songs LIVE on Sveriges Radio, specifically, Radio P4 Gavleborg, on Friday at 15:30 Swedish Time, which is 9:30 a.m. Eastern U.S./Canada.

Please take a listen to her via http://sverigesradio.se/gavleborg/ and let me know what you think.

But if you miss her, you WILL be able to listen to Cecilia here on the blog at some point soon, because one of the very best things about Sveriges Radio is that they make almost everything they air available online, and best of all, with embeddable code for blogs and websites.

(You longtime readers of the blog will recall that I've posted lots of SR audio material here in the past for Timoteij, Full of Keys, First Aid Kit and other singing artists, as well as various pieces they've done on Melodisfestivalen.)

So, even if you miss her, I'll have her right here where you can take a listen just as soon as it's humanly possible, more than likely, this weekend.

Wednesday morning update:

Cecilia Nilsson - In My Room (Complete Song)

Cecilia Nilsson YouTube Channel: Cecilia Nilsson -In My Room. This is Cecilia's debut single. Uploaded May 13, 2013. http://youtu.be/r3MUHpMTAao

Cissi's new single is available on both iTunes and Spotify.

There's just no substitute for sheer talent!
And when you add a great work ethic to that, the sky is the limit.
-----
More info at: https://www.facebook.com/cecilianilssonofficial
http://instagram.com/cecilianilssonofficial
@CissiNilssonn - https://twitter.com/CissiNilssonn

Andreas Jismark Management 
http://andreasjismark.se
@andreasjismark -https://twitter.com/andreasjismark 
http://www.youtube.com/user/JismarkManagement

Uh-oh! Upcoming BBC World Service 'Open Eyes' segment on racial tensions in Malmö. Hmm-m...; Swedish immigration policy costs borne by local residents

The amazing diversity of a city called Malmö...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtUopabsELM
Earlier today, quite unexpectedly, I heard an on-air promo for the BBC World Service on an "Open Eyes" segment airing on Jan. 19th, dealing with racial tensions (and illegal immigration?) in M...
No, not perpetual ethnic and crime hothouse Miami, but Malmö, only an ethnically diverse city with one of the most well-educated populaces in the world. Hmm-m-m...

(And, as it happens, it's home to some friends of your faithful blogger, some of whom were alluded to in my post about Crown Princess Victoria's wedding, who drove to Stockholm and got-up early to find good places to watch the ceremonies.)

Malmö is sort of like the more interesting and charming parts of Baltimore, Pittsburgh and Indianapolis I've been to, where you meet nice, friendly, well-educated and well-rounded people, and see why they really love it there and want to raise their families there.

Their idea of happiness is NOT a high-rise condo near the water in an area that's beset with gridlocked traffic and out-of-control city and county governments that specialize in raising taxes and lip service.
They have very different criteria for a nice Quality-of-Life, and proximity to Nordstrom's or The Cheesecake Factory is NOT one of them. It really makes you think!

And like those three American cities that I'm pretty familiar with, which have very good colleges there, Malmö has been busy successfully re-inventing itself as a home to education, technology and innovation.

City's official hemsida: http://www.malmo.se/
Malmö Visitor & Tourist homepage, in English: http://www.malmotown.com/en

And whether you tend to believe Wikipedia in general or not, according to the current Wikipedia entry on Malmö, which seems mostly accurate as I read it,

"Immigrant Muslims comprise a little over 25% of population and their share keeps on rising. It is predicted that Malmö would be more than 50% Muslim by 2020."

As of now, I don't know what time the segment will air on the BBC on the 19th, but I will keep checking every so often and let you know here once I find out.

When I put my ear to the ground to listen for the sound of approaching hoof-beats -my Indian name is "Discerning voice that carries" -I sense (fear) another well-intentioned but ultimately politically biased and self-fulfilling report akin to so many over-the-top NPR segments I heard broadcast under Bush 43, that seemed designed to marginalize the legitimate concerns of real people with real problems, in this case, the residents of Malmö, in order to engage in agitprop under the guise of journalism.

The likely result?
Mockery of the town and a blown opportunity to understand a complicated issue that has finally
resulted in the Sweden Democrats, Sverigedemokrarna, i.e SD, finally getting into the
Riksdag, the Swedish parliament. http://sverigedemokraterna.se/

To me, this is an entirely predictable result, and not unlike the rise of the Tea Party and their activists in the U.S., as a vocal response to Obama's public policies, it was the proof that for every action, there is an opposite and equal reaction.

Some of those NPR stories I heard then were always sort of hard to pigeonhole and figure out just who they were trying to "educate."
"But next, a feminist leader in Ecuador talks about the Vagina Monologues finally coming to Quito."
Yeah, too many curious stories like that with not so thinly-veiled political bias made me realize that listening to NPR so much was just a poor use of my time, which is why I rarely listen to it now. http://www.npr.org/

Frankly, now it just sounds too much like White House and DCCC propaganda, once-removed.

As to the upcoming BBC program, there are many things I wonder about, mostly, to what extent it will have a fair-minded prologue accurately describing the situation that average Swedish citizens find themselves in -a box they can't get out of.

For instance, though it will change after this year, until now, non-European students who come to Sweden get their university education for FREE, paid for by Swedish citizens.

In Sweden, local governments, not the national govt. in the form of the Riksdag, pay the majority of the real costs associated with immigration and assimilation policy, legal and illegal, which are REQUIRED, not optional.

In that sense, local governments there have an 'unfunded mandate,' but there's nobody like
the Dept. of Homeland Security, ICE or DOJ with pots of grant money or stimulus funds
to help a town reconcile their budget costs.
YOU HAVE TO PAY.

As you might imagine, this has a profound effect on municipal budgets in ways that, well, certain large U.S. cities and newspaper editorial boards with pro-amnesty sensibilities, like the Miami Herald, can't possibly imagine or appreciate.

It's a simple fact that at some Swedish colleges, the Masters programs are more than 50% full of Asian students who DON'T pay, which means that Swedish taxpayers are not only paying for someone who is NOT from their own country, but who, possibly, are elbowing out their own son or daughter of their higher education.
THAT brings the issue home in a very tangible way.

University fees might weaken Swedish universities
http://www.stockholmnews.com/Default.aspx

Nope, with no money trees to shake in Washington, with high-paid lobbyists, the favored South Florida approach, local Swedish governments and citizens pay close to the full freight for an immigration policy they can't change.
Imagine you were them, how would THAT make you feel?

So when was the last time you read or heard about this in a mainstream media news story in the U.S.?

When the time comes during the course of the year for local Swedish governments to set their budget priorities and make them public, do elected officials vote to close a popular library because of the costs associated with immigration assimilation education programs, or do you cut certain Parks & Recreation programs for kids, or close the park a few days a week, so that you can pay for some program for Somali or Turkish emigres?
Hmm-m-m...

Around the time of the Swedish parliamentary elections in September, which saw the return to power of Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt, the first center-right prime minister to lead the country for two periods in a row, this time, with a four-party Red-Green coalition, I came across
a fascinating budget story that really brought home to me the costs of their ridiculous immigration policy, though the truth is, I came across it while looking for something else.
This story concerned a northern Swedish town called Gävle, which is roughly about half the size of next-door Hollywood (FL), but like Hollywood, located on the water, in Gävle's case, on the Baltic Sea.
It's also one of the oldest towns in the entire country.

In a September 8th story that appeared in Gefle Dagblad, http://gd.se/ the local chairman there, Roger Hedlund, argues that the government grant of 40 million SEK only covers 22 percent of the costs of refugee protection.
Guess who pays the rest? Do the math!

Here's an excerpt from the story from September:
Sverigedemokraterna vill skrota orkestern Orkestern och flyktingar kostar för mycket enligt SD

Statsbidraget för flyktingmottagandet täcker bara 22 procent av kostnaderna, hävdar Sverigedemokraterna och hänvisar till Sveriges kommuner och landsting. SKL säger att siffran är mellan 70 och 90 procent.
Om Gävle kommun säger upp avtalet med Migrationsverket blir det 153 miljoner kronor över. Pengar som kan satsas på bland annat parboendegaranti och en skattesänkning med 55 öre. Siffrorna presenterades av Sverigedemokraterna i går, när de lade fram sitt lokala valmanifest och en skuggbudget för Gävle kommun.

Ordföranden i Gävle, Roger Hedlund, hävdar att statsbidraget på 40 miljoner kronor bara täcker 22 procent av kostnaderna för flyktingmottagandet.

Would people in South Florida, esp. the pro-amnesty crowd at the Miami Herald's editorial board and and local TV stations' management, and their decisions about what is and is not aired on local newscasts, look at immigration differently if 70-90% of the cost of services given to and provided by the U.S. to immigrants, illegal or otherwise, was borne NOT by the federal government, but by the individual state, county and city and the citizens who live HERE?

Not money coming out of some abstract wallet, not money being printed on some U.S. Treasury printing press, but directly out of their own individual wallet, purse and bank account, affecting their life and their family's?

At the local level, where they can see exactly what local and state govt. services are necessarily eliminated or cut back because of the costs involved in dealing with immigrants? Guess what, that's the reality of the average Swedish citizen.

They and their family have to make do without something because their money is being used for a purpose that they are opposed to, and yet when they complain about something being amiss in their representative democracy, and the costs of this, they are called, at a minimum, selfish and racist, and often quite worse by the condescending domestic and international news media, plus many of their fellow citizens.
Hmm-m-m... sound familiar?
Below, a very typical NPR view of what happened in the Swedish election, with zero context or understanding, but then they never understood Ross Perot's appeal, either, did they?
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2010/09/20/129995071/anti-immigrant-party-in-sweden-wins-seats
It sounds exactly like what we all heard and read constantly by the American news media about The Tea Party this year.
THAT kind of condescending and dismissive attitude, without any proper context, I suspect, is exactly what the BBC may well have in store for the city of Malmö and its citizens in less than a fortnight.


I wrote about September's Swedish national election here:
Sept. 16th, 2010 post:
SACC New York will be hosting Swedish Election Watch Party at Aquavit on Sunday from 1-5 p.m. http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2010/09/sacc-new-york-will-be-hosting-swedish.html

Sept. 10th, 2010 post:
Sunday Multi-tasking: I'm watching the 2010 Swedish election returns LIVE on SVT -AND the Dolphins at Vikings ballgame!
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2010/09/sunday-multi-tasking-im-watching-2010.html