These are six program entries that include award winners and newcomers; style creators and developers, bearers of tradition and those who are right at the forefront. As an audience member, in Harstad you will be able to take a journey into parts of the new Sami music landscape - without leaving the city. It is a privilege.

The sound of the future

It is important for the Festivals to have their finger on the cultural pulse of northern Norway. We put artists and artists who have impact on the poster, and again this year a number of them have a Sami background.

Elektronika artist Niilas is an award winner and acclaimed for his field recordings from the Arctic in harmony with deep bass. Niilas has received spectacular reviews with sixes on the dice. He has also been awarded the Spellemann award for the year's best album in the Elektronika category - and is coming to Festspillene for a club night in Sentralen.

Arvvas, with bassist and singer Steinar Raknes and joiker Sara Marielle Gaup Beaska delivers powerful and dynamic music at the intersection of joik and Americana.

Hildá Länsman is one of the most active Sami artists at the moment, and is coming to Harstad hn together with Finnish sound designer Tuomas Norvio. The duo's soundscape is based on Hildá's airy, buzzing, growling and translucent vocal sounds in the face of Tuomas' dense electronics and samples. Dynamitt, wrote Harstad Tidende after the concert at Márkomannu last year.

Emil Karlsen is perhaps best known as a vocalist and songwriter in the band Resiklurert. He has also been a judge and coach in the NRK program Stjernekamp. For this year's festival, he is coming with a band and string players from the Arctic Philharmonic. In their baggage, they have a sound image rarely heard in Sápmi: a modern band foundation with melodic vocals and poetic lyrics, wrapped in classical strings and dizzying sonic universes.

Vokal nord comes with the concert Sávri, which mixes modern, Sami-inspired choral music and repertoire from the Baroque. The choir has been working with Sami-inspired music since the production of "Sami romances" - a memorial concert for Nils-Aslak Valkeapää - during the Festspillene in 2002. Since then, the ensemble has had a long journey with studies of various foreign singing techniques, commissioned works from domestic and foreign composers and performing concerts with the material. With this year's festival concert, the choir is back where the Sami track started.

Riot Gáhpagat - a Sylfrian punk band consisting of young Sami women and non-binary between 18-26 years of age, with a burning commitment to fight back against injustice, sees the light of day during the Festival. This is an initiative from Márkomannu, and is being formed as a response to the ongoing threat to the Sami way of life and culture. During the Festspillene, we will get a taste, Thursday 29 June at 22:00 at Sentralen, at what will be the band's official concert debut during Márkomeannu 2023. Free entry.