Classical Music

Classical Music

Edvard Grieg (1843-1907), Carl Nielsen (1865-1931) and Jean Sibelius (1865-1957) are generally recognized as the Nordic countries’ most important composers. Nielsen and Sibelius were both inspired and influenced in their early years by Grieg’s music. Their idiom was strongly Romantic, but they managed to create a distinct “Nordic Sound” in which national elements combined with the broader European tradition. This album not only shows this, but also probes the way they were inspired by one another. Moreover, the works on this release are among the artists’ personal favorites, with a Northern Timbre they feel resonates, no matter where you are. Ragnhild Hemsing and Tor Espen Aspaas began playing as regular recital partners in 2010 in preparation for the recording of Ragnhild’s debut album, which featured works by Norwegian composers in addition to traditional folk music played on a Hardanger fiddle. This musical partnership has subsequently been consolidated with numerous concerts, tours, recordings and broadcasts both in and outside of Norway. The two musicians have also guested each other’s chamber music festivals-respectively the Hemsing Festival in Aurdal/Valdres and the Winter Chamber Music Festival in Roros- and collaborated on new projects as part of the festival programmes.

On this album Kjell Tore Innervik performs Morton Feldman's The King of Denmark and Iannis Xenakis's Psappha, exploring the intimate performing space with large format recording techniques, engaging the listener in immersive audio. The Xenakis was recorded twice: once from the perspective of an intimate listener, and a second time literally "over-head", giving a first-persona perspective. The difference not only in microphone technique but also in the performer's state of mind and how he projects his playing has a profound impact on the listening experience. Radical Interpretations of Iconic Musical Works for Percussion (2013-2017) was an interdisciplinary artistic research project hosted at the Norwegian Academy of Music in collaboration with the Oslo Academy of the Arts, the Oslo School of Architecture and Design, Westerdals Oslo ACT and 2L through the Norwegian Artistic Research Programme. A utopia, a non-existent place, is a projection where there are no constraints of practicality, nothing to hold you back. Such is the approach to the music on this album- in each piece of music, using all the resources at their disposal, the recording engineers unite the composer, performer, recording artist and listener, and take them at least some of the way to a utopia.

Classical Music

As compositions, the three works featured on this release echo the intensity, visions, and personal character of the composers. Benjamin Britten’s 1937 work Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge was composed at the request of Boyd Neel. Neel later conducted the premiere at the 1937 Salzburg Festival. The composition, which launched Britten into international acclaim, was dedicated “to F.B. A tribute with affection and admiration. Bridge had been Britten’s teacher beginning in 1927. Vaughan Williams’ Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis was composed in 1910 and premiered later that year at the Three Choirs Festival. Many of Vaughan Williams’ compositions are inspired by music of the Renaissance, this piece, however, is the most directly linked. It is based on a theme by Thomas Tallis (1505-1585), one of the most well known Renaissance composers. A ballet in two tableaux, Stravinsky’s Apollon musagete was composed between 1927 and 1928, and choreographed in 1928. The story is based on the Greek legend of Apollo, the God of music, and his visit from the Muses.

Human creativity is versatile and endless. If we enthuse about something we feel a need to convey that enthusiasm to others - to quote, to recite. Creativity is thus closely bound up with inspiration. One of the oldest and most resilient ways of fostering cultural life is to "borrow" ideas. In music this has been normal practice as long as there have been songs and singers to sing them. In the Romantic period, this musical borrowing became an art form in its own right, with world-famous virtuosos and composers leading the way. But there are also artists today who relish this art form. Ole Edvard Antonsen and Wolfgang Plagge are two exemplary examples on this release!

Lasse Thoresen is a bold exponent of contemporary Scandinavian music, inspired by a culture rich in tradition where new instrumental techniques express a unique range of feelings. His chamber music for flute and piano is here performed by Maiken and Trond Schau with a virtuosity that succeeds in evoking an immediate response from the listener in its revitalization of a time-honoured musical language.

For centuries, hymns have transported people through grief, joy, faith and doubt, in everyday life and in times of celebration. The rich treasury of words and music in our hymnbook seeks to preserve and renew tradition. It is a tradition that is far from static, evolving through new interpretations by composers, poets and performers of today. On this recording the three composers Marcus Paus, Marianne Reidarsdatter Eriksen and Morten Christophersen contribute new works based on old hymns. It is here that the hymn tradition reveals it's strength, and old words are discovered anew through new arrangements and compositions. These tracks have been recorded in Immersive Audio. Immersive Audio is a sonic sculpture that you can literally move around and relate to spatially; surrounded by music you can move about in the aural space and choose angles, vantage points and positions.

The Norwegian violinist Ole Bull (1810-1880) is often called "the Nordic Paganini". Wherever he played, he held audiences spellbound with his incredible technique and personal charisma. In his native Norway he is revered first and foremost for his pioneering and dynamic role in the movement for a national identity in the fields of music and the dramatic arts. Bull recognized Henrik Ibsen's and Bjornstjerne Bjornson's potential as dramatists and gave them indispensable opportunities to advance their careers at his Norwegian theatre in Bergen. He held Norwegian folk music in as high esteem as he did European classical music, and he incorporated national melodies in his compositions to portray Norwegian nature and life, for example in Norges Fjelde and Vilspel i Lio. This recording, a sequel to the album that violinist Annar Folleso and the Norwegian Radio Orchestra released in 2010, features compositions that have only been played by Ole Bull himself, and which therefore have not been heard since his death in 1880. Largo posato e Rond� capriccioso (1841) and Fantasy on "Lilly Dale" (1872) are not just examples of Bull's international style - they also bear witness to his stamina as performer and virtuoso. The surviving musical manuscripts are incomplete, but Wolfgang Plagge, with his intimate knowledge of Bull's composition technique, and in collaboration with Annar Folleso, has been able to reconstruct the music.

Classical Music

Composer Torbjorn Dyrud's work presents the most famous story of Christian culture - Christ's passion, death and resurrection - in a form you have never heard before. The work is not a passion in the traditional sense; it does not end with Christ's death but continues through the kingdom of death and out of the grave, leaving US with the gospel of love that overcomes and endures everything, a gospel of grace and forgiveness. Life is the light of mankind; we can rise out of the darkness.

Acquiring life skills during a challenging, fragile phase of life — learning to belong, to feel seen and included, learning to build friendships — all of this lies at the core of the Nidaros Cathedral Girls' Choir's mission. The Requiem in Andrew Smith's version, commissioned by the choir, is loosely based on the Roman Catholic mass for the dead. Several of the texts of the traditional Requiem Mass have been replaced, however, with biblical references to the tragic fate of children, reflecting the all-too-frequent conflicts of today in which the young are innocent victims. The musical material in the Requiem takes its inspiration from Gregorian chant. Melodic fragments of the ancient requiem mass can be heard in the background. Trygve Seim's improvising saxophone makes up an integral part of the whole, yet lives a life of its own in close companionship with the singers and Ståle Storløkken on organ. The palette is expanded with the glorious strings of TrondheimSolistene in Ståle Kleiberg's Hymn to Love and The Light (with Petra Bjørkhaug, organ). These works add dimensions of faith, hope and love. And light too, when all seems dark. In life there are moments to treasure, and challenges to overcome. In the words of Helge Torvund: The light you need exists.

Composer �rjan Matre has worked with Oslo Chamber Choir for over a decade. For Veneliti he has been able to profit from the choir's strong traditions in folk music in his sonic interpretations of Norwegian folk songs - fervent hymns, mystical legends and bittersweet love songs. By returning to the songs' sources and how they have traditionally been sung, Matre has preserved their core identity, giving it new life and meaning in his sonic world. Recorded here in immersive audio, you, the listener, take part in this world as if you were sitting in the choir yourself. The music you are about to listen to has been on a long journey before it finally reaches your ears. It comprises fervent hymns, mystical legends and bitter love songs. Exactly where the journey began, however, is not easy to say, but along the way the songs gain new life through the people who sing them, each time with a slightly different shape, a different feeling, maybe a new purpose - but at their core, they remain the same. �rjan Matre has listened to the songs, to the singers who perform them, and has listened to old recordings of the songs, where possible. By doing this, he has been able to identify the songs' core identity - a tricky task given the difficulties of translating such melodies through traditional scoring systems. Therefore, rather than being traditional arrangements, Matre's compositions are more a sonic interpretation of that very identity. Unni L�vlid has been teaching the choir in traditional styles of singing. By learning by ear, rather than reading the music, the singers have acquired a different kind of "ownership" of both the music and the lyrics. In addition, this approach allows for the singers to inject more of their own personality into the music. As for the live performances, conductor Hakon Daniel Nystedt has continued the by-ear approach, and, in so doing, has created a holistic expression in which the uniqueness of each voice becomes apparent.

Nikolai Medtner's music fascinates and surprises, in the midst of what also seems to be well known. You may imagine that you have heard the melodies before, in childhood or in a dream. But, even if you haven't, it is as if you have been waiting for this music to return. In some mysterious way, it evokes the memory of the unheard. He named many of his piano pieces SKAZKA - tale. Some of them carry subtitles, but it is uncertain whether the composer had specific narratives in mind, as the name would suggest. The influential Soviet musicologists Boris Asafyev may have been right when he claimed that "these are not descriptive tales or tales that illustrate an event. These are tales of personal experiences - of conflicts in the inner life of man". In this recording, Gunnar Sama plays five of Medtner's albums, composed over the course of some 30 years.