Barbara Helsingius

Who is Barbara Helsingius?

Barbara Helsingius is a Swedish-speaking Finnish olympic fencer, singer and poet.

She participated at the 1960 Summer Olympics. Trained as a gym teacher, she took her masters in pedagogy at Stanford University. Interested in American art and folk music, she began to record, and her first release, was a collection of American folk songs, translated to Finnish. She became well-known internationally, and is a member of Visens venner in Norway, of Visans Vänner in Helsinki and Yrkestrubadurernas Forening in Sweden, part of the Svenska Visakademien and the joint Nordic cultural organisation NordVisa. From 1969-1975, she lived in Oslo with her husband, Hank Koski, a diplomat at the USA's embassy. Her family now live in Espoo.