Paul Wilson and Mary Abendroth are a husband and wife team from Brainerd, Mn. They present songs, tunes and dances from Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Scandinavian-America. They have performed all over the United States and toured in Scandinavia. Paul and Mary were featured in a PBS documentary “River of Song” and have performed on “A Prairie Home Companion” radio show. They started and host one of Scandinavian musicians’ favorite annual festivals, the Nisswa-Stämma. They perform both as a duo in in several ensembles, and have been involved in 9 audio recordings over the years. Paul and Mary have presented many programs to Sons of Norway chapters all over the the midwest.  In addition, they have worked in schools for twenty five years teaching Scandinavian music and dance and especially enjoy working with younger elementary grades. Paul plays button accordion and fiddle and Mary plays pump organ and guitar and sings. In their school programs they like to work with three (or sometimes four) classes per day. They start their program with an informational segment about folk music and in particular, Scandinavian folk music and dancing. What is folk music? How is it learned? In the process they talk about their instruments, play some tunes, answer some questions, etc. The second half of the program is the active part where all of the kids are invited to participate in learning and doing dances. At the end of the program the couple does some demonstration folk dances for the kids. When there is enough time in a school... usually at least two days... then Paul & Mary like to get all the kids involved in performing for a school wide program on the second day...doing the dances they have learned in previous day’s classes. Paul & Mary also do some performing during that school wide show, but they like to make the kids performing as the focus of the program. Paul Wilson / Mary Abendroth 16586 Nokay Lake Rd Brainerd, Mn  56401 218 764 2994 pwilson@brainerd.net http://www.brainerd.net/~pwilson