Read news from:
Austria
SHARE
COPY LINK
MY SWEDISH CAREER

JOBS

‘Sweden isn’t for everyone. You have to be open to change’

Brazilian guitarist Thiago Trinsi has studied at the prestigious Berklee College of Music and taught in three continents. Now living in Sweden, he explains to The Local why he thinks his new instructional videos can help other musicians to take a step forward with their playing.

Published: 7 November 2016 06:59 CET
'Sweden isn't for everyone. You have to be open to change'
Brazilian guitarist Thiago Trinsi who now lives in Sweden. Photo: Cha Trinsi

It’s not often that internationals moving to Sweden do so because they want to come to a bigger country, but that’s exactly the case for Trinsi.

“I was living in Iceland for eight years, teaching music technology in public schools, and I thought it would be nice to move to a bigger country that has more access to other countries,” he explains. “Iceland is an island and you need air travel for everything!”

“So that was the idea. I started applying for jobs in the field and got a job and moved here two years ago,” he continues.

The job came in Härjedalen, a small, mostly rural county in central Sweden bordering Norway with a population of only 10,000 people.

It’s a dramatically different place to his native Porto Alegre in southern Brazil, a city which with more than 4.4 million people in the metropolitan area, is about twice as big as Swedish capital Stockholm.

“It was good for me to get my knowledge in Brazil, because it was during a time when you could get inspired by others there. They’re just more into the passion of it, making things happen. If you are good, you have your space and you can have success. In Sweden, if you’re good it doesn’t matter. You need to be someone’s friend and most of the time you need to be Swedish,” he notes.


Cha Trinsi. Photo: Private

Don’t be fooled though. Even if the close-knit nature of the music community in Sweden can be frustrating at times, Trinsi has plenty of positive things to say about his life there.

“The quality of life is way better. It’s great. Everything is clean, the system works. In Brazil it can be chaos. For inspiration, you get a lot. For learning music, it’s the best place. But after you graduate and need to get a life you should move to somewhere like Sweden which has a great system,” he suggests.

“It’s very hard to pay the bills in Brazil if you’re a music teacher. Sweden is much easier. If you’re a teacher you can pay your bills, travel.”

It was while teaching music in schools in Sweden that Trinsi finally decided to put his latest lesson concept into practice. The idea had been with him for a while: to create a new, more comprehensive way for guitarists to improve their alternate picking technique. With life in Sweden going well, it was time to get the venture off the ground.

“I have worked for companies doing video lessons before but it was different. I created an idea for a guitar solo with a few techniques, then broke it down into pieces to show people how it is played both slowly and quickly,” he notes.

“But then I saw that guitar players, especially in rock and metal, struggle with authentic technique, playing their up and downstrokes cleanly. I started looking for something on the internet that could change that, but everything was the same, I couldn’t find it.”


Cha Trinsi. Photo: Private

Realizing there was a gap in knowledge waiting to be filled, he started formulating his lesson plan.

“I took about eight months researching, experimenting and attempting to develop the lessons in a better way. I got great results, and it really changed my playing and brought it to a brand new level. It was really exciting, so I decided to make it into ten studies that everyone has access to.”

Trinsi’s package combines videos, e-books, musical notation, guitar pro (a form of guitar tablature musical notation), files and audio playback. It’s an impressively comprehensive effort, inspired by a desire to do things better.

“I’ve got a way to work here. It’s not like in Brazil, where for example if I needed someone to mix something, I always knew a friend who knew a guy who does it to a very high level. Here I need to become a master of these things and do it myself. It’s very hard to find people. And the people you do find charge a lot of money for it. I understand why, it’s very difficult to do it,” he muses.

“Knowledge is something that comes to you and stays forever. I’ve been teaching for more than 18 years, developing materials for schools, so I’m used to working fast. It doesn’t take me so long to master a subject.”

Even if he has decades of experience, the Porto Alegre native explains that he is always hoping to learn new things. Though he is trained in orchestration at Berklee College in the US, he still thinks there is plenty to learn from Swedish music, and in particular its master producers.

“If I take a Katy Perry song written by Max Martin, I can put some headphones on and it’s like a lesson. You hear the elements, how well it’s produced and composed, it’s great.”

“Swedes are very good composers and producers.”

His hope is to one day work with some of Sweden’s big musicians.

“One of the points of coming here is I know it’s the land of heavy metal. A lot of great bands are from here. I hope to work with some of those guys one day, record for them or play a gig with them. I’m always open to new projects.”

Yet some of the biggest inspiration Sweden has provided for him comes not from its musical masters, but from the kids he teaches regularly.

“I love my day job and I feel great doing it. A huge percentage of my students are from Afghanistan and Syria. It’s really nice to see them develop and play contemporary music, the things they hear on the radio. They let me hear stuff from their countries too on Youtube, and I’ll take a listen, then in two minutes show them how to play it. It always adds something.”

As for whether working in music in Sweden would be easier if he lived in a hub like Stockholm or Gothenburg, the Brazilian thinks the internet makes up most of the difference.

“In terms of gigs or projects it can be tough not being in Stockholm or Gothenburg, but with the internet I can do pretty much everything except concerts. I record for artists in Europe, the USA, Brazil and Asia. Last year I recorded for a Grammy-nominated producer,” he boasts.

“I can pretty much do all my work here from my home studio. If I was in Stockholm, just getting from my home to the studio could take a couple of hours or something. In a town it’s easier, and everything is here in a way thanks to the internet.”

Ultimately, as an artist he is always looking for different experiences, whether they are in Sweden, or teaching in the USA and Denmark as he currently does.

Going forward, Trinsi plans on developing more teaching packages. “It’ll be a surprise,” he hints. “I can blend weird things like Balkan and Spanish music and make it work. So I’ll be working on more and more techniques, composition maybe someday. More packages but in different styles.”


Cha Trinsi. Photo: Private

As for his location, for the moment he is happy in rural Sweden, but he does have some important advice for any Brazilians looking to move there.

“Sweden isn’t for everyone. You have to be open to change. You have to change yourself first. Every country has a mentality and if you’re open you can move forward and be happy,” he recommends.

“Sometimes I see Brazilians here who complain they don’t have what they had in Brazil, but they don’t see the big picture. Sweden has a lot more to offer than just thinking about the kind of bread you liked to get in Brazil.”

Before bringing our chat to an end, The Local couldn’t resist asking the composer what he thinks of Sweden's big musical talking point of recent months. Should Bob Dylan have been awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature?

“Bob Dylan is an icon, he’s present in many life stories with his music and poetry. He deserves it.” Trinsi concludes.

For members

READER INSIGHTS

How to find a job in Sweden: Five tips from those who’ve been there, done that

The Swedish job market poses unique challenges for newcomers. The Local's readers share their best tips for cracking the career code.

Published: 10 April 2024 11:32 CEST
Updated: 13 April 2024 15:50 CEST
How to find a job in Sweden: Five tips from those who've been there, done that

Network, network, network!

A statistic that often gets tossed around is that seven out of ten jobs in Sweden are obtained through personal connections, and there’s no doubt that a good network is crucial to your job hunt, making the labour market extra challenging for newcomers to the country.

In fact, networking was the main tip mentioned by The Local’s readers.

“The job market is quite hot in Sweden, and talent is in short supply. People hiring do not have a lot of time to find the right talent, and tips from friends, colleagues and former colleagues are the way to first, find out organisations are hiring, and secondly, get your CV on the short list,” said Kyle, a Canadian reader who works in innovation management in Gothenburg.

“If you are going for a major employer like Volvo, network gets you in the door, as HR does not have much to do with hiring… the hiring managers do all of it and have no time, due to the insane number of consensus meetings. If you are looking for smaller organisations, they have even less time to find people, and networking is their primary way to find talent,” he added.

NETWORKING IN SWEDEN:

Some of the networking tips readers mentioned were going to job fairs, getting an internship to help you establish connections in your preferred field, joining clubs (this could be anything from your local gardening association to meetups for coders, but focus on clubs that may be popular among people working in your chosen field), and drawing on your organic network of friends, neighbours and others.

Don’t neglect the groundwork

The saying “dress for the job you want, not the job you have” is getting worn out (and people may look at you funny if you turn up to interviews in a Batman suit), but there’s truth to the notion of making sure you know what you want – and preparing for it.

In other words, don’t wait for a job ad to appear before you start to customise your CV and figure out what skill set you need. Create your CV now so that you’re ready to tweak it to your dream job – you could even have a general look at job ads in your field to see what requirements are needed. And don’t forget to spruce up your LinkedIn profile so that it fits with your career goals.

“I believe that several factors contribute to successfully landing a desirable job in Sweden. It’s essential to prepare to meet the requirements beyond just having a university degree. Many individuals realise these requirements only after completing their studies when they start searching for a job, which can be too late,” said Adnan Aslam from Pakistan, who works as a food inspector.

“I recommend identifying the job advertisements for positions you aspire to hold in the future and then preparing for those requirements during your studies. For me, acquiring a basic level of proficiency in the Swedish language and obtaining a Swedish driving licence were crucial. I pursued these goals during my studies and was able to secure a desirable job before graduating,” he added.

READ ALSO:

Felipe Cabral even has a GPT assistant trained on his own CVs and old cover letters, and said the set-up only takes ten minutes if you already have your documents. “With that in place, you can give instructions like: Read this job description and create a tailored version of my CV and letter for it. (…) Remember to always review and ask it not to create data aside from your documents.”

Be flexible and ready to adapt

Moving to a new place inevitably means having to learn not just the practicalities such as how to write a CV or which websites to use to look for job openings, but also learning how to navigate a new culture with all its unspoken expectations.

Swedish workplaces are generally less hierarchical than many other countries, but that doesn’t mean you can say whatever you want whenever you want without anyone raising an eyebrow. Swedes are usually direct, but be careful of being too abrasive or boastful: raising your voice, even during a spirited argument, or banging your own drum to show off your skills may not go down well.

“Talk, deliberate, complain like a Swede and you’ll come across like you know what the job entails, so your trustworthiness increases,” said an Indian data analyst who preferred to remain anonymous.

“Office politics are just as strong in Sweden as anywhere else. The flat hierarchy is deceiving as social hierarchy is enforced quite a bit in that lack of formal hierarchy. Take your time in learning these dynamics wherever you work before revealing your talent and capabilities. Expect those internal politics to happen, and they won’t hurt so much when they do,” said Kyle, the Canadian reader in Gothenburg.

This article about Swedish office politics may be useful.

Stay true to yourself

Adapting to your surroundings is one thing. Completely changing who you are is another.

For one thing, your happiness is as important as your career progression, and for another, your foreignness need not be an impediment: it’s also a skill that sets you apart from the rest. It means you have unique experience, and also, in the right setting, provides an opportunity to sometimes violate those social rules we mentioned above, because people assume you will, anyway.

“Trust is key. Build trust in your network, work with integrity. It’s OK to violate jantelagen if you are maintaining integrity. Sometimes your outsider and more honest/open opinion will burn bridges, especially those that may feel threatened by talent. But it will build trust with other colleagues who see it as brave and more trustworthy to work with,” said Kyle from Canada.

Hunker down for the long haul

We don’t want to scare you, because there are plenty of examples of people who quickly find their dream job in Sweden and settle into their new workplace, enjoying perks such as long summer holidays, generous parental leave and the famous work-life balance.

But if you do find it tougher than you expected: know that you’re not alone.

Several readers who responded to the survey said they were still trying to find a job in Sweden.

“I found jobs all over Europe but not here. They say they have a lack of experienced senior engineers but the don’t seem to be doing much to solve this,” said a Brazilian in Gothenburg.

A reader from Bangladesh said she was “at a loss” as to how to make a career change from her current AI role in Stockholm, despite many years of experience as an IT project manager.

“Over the past 18 months, I’ve submitted over 600 applications to various organisations. Unfortunately, despite being overqualified for some positions, I’ve faced rejections at every turn, from both large and small companies. The job market here, especially for foreign-born women, feels overwhelmingly challenging,” she said, adding that the struggle had impacted her mental health.

The Local has on several occasions reported on foreign residents’ struggle to get a foot on the Swedish job ladder, with many facing hurdles such as employers’ unfamiliarity with international degrees, discrimination, or a lack of network that can provide paths into a company.

So during the job hunt, don’t forget to care for yourself. Share your concerns with fellow job-seekers, ask for help and join networking groups – this is good not just for creating new contacts, but also in terms of your social well-being and meeting people who are in a similar situation.

And finally, as one British reader in Stockholm advised, keep looking: “Be open-minded with the opportunities that present themselves. It isn’t an easy market to enter and doesn’t feel inclusive.” But he added, “don’t give up”.

SHOW COMMENTS