This album is a compilation of 17 highly significant recordings made in Copenhagen between August 1959 and February 1960 that for the most part are previously unreleased. It was a period when the Danish jazz scene was buzzing with expatriate American musicians and the efforts of local artists, who, after a period of assimilation had now expropriated the bop and hard bop styles for themselves and were finding their feet. The central exhibit are three tracks (some 15 minutes playing time) by the Stan Getz Quartet with Jan Johansson on piano, Oscar Pettiford on bass and Joe Harrris on drums. This is a period that is not that well documented, so these recordings have considerable interest. Getz would take Johansson on Norman Granz's spring 1960 tour of Europe with Jazz at the Philharmonic (Ray Brown and Ed Thigpen would play bass and drums respectively) making Johansson the only European to have appeared under the JATP monicker. Oscar Pettiford is featured extensively with a trio he led with the fine Danish hard bop pianist Bent Axen. The Danish vibraphonist Louis Hjulmand appears on five tracks – two trio and one quartet with Johansson and Pettiford omnipresent to provide the main interest. The album's coup de grace is three solo piano tracks by Johansson recorded at the Montmartre Jazzhus in Copenhagen of ‘Ack Värmeland, Du Skona’, ‘Emigrantvisan’ and ‘Farfar's Song’ in August 1959.

These Swedish folksongs reflect Johansson's concerns to reflect a Scandinavian component in jazz and are especially interesting as he was already working on the concept some two years before his magnum opus Jazz per Svenska in 1962 – indeed, ‘Emigrantvisan’ would actually appear on the album.