Egil Hovland's life and range of activities can be viewed as a long journey through ever-changing musical landscapes. He was born into a musical family with ties to Seiersten bedehus, a religious meetinghouse. Thus Hovland's earliest musical impulses were revival hymns. From there, his path led to an education in church music. When he had attained the highest level his country could offer, and with excellent marks, he continued his journey with composition studies in Norway, Denmark, Italy, and the U.S. Hovland wrote large works - symphonies, concertos, operas, choral works, organ music, and much more - and composed smaller-scale works, such as chorales and biblical hymns. In some aspects of his compositional activity, Hovland was someone who sought out new paths and broke new ground.

Classical Music

In the composer Øyvind Mæland's own words: “The works on this [album] were written in the period 2008-2012. Already this feels remarkably long ago- at the time I was a student at the Norwegian Academy of Music, but because I realize that these works have been important to me as a composer I have neither been able- nor wanted- to throw them to the wind. I found many elements that pointed towards more recent works… also recorded on LAWO by Stine Motland and the ensemble Aksiom. This is contemporary music scored for very traditional instrument combinations such as piano solo, duo for violin and piano, string quartet, and “Lieder”- the latter, however, with the prefix “sci-fi.”

Classical Music

Classical Music

If the world is brimming over with anything, then it is love songs lasting three to five minutes. Nevertheless, Currentes is adding a new collection to this evergrowing number. Why? Well, we believe we can offer something new. Virtually all of these beautiful songs, written when the rhyme moon/June was first conceived, are essentially unknown to today’s listeners. Those who may already know some of the songs will nonetheless enjoy these creative new Currentes arrangements and instrumentations. And for those who thought that the piano was an eighteenth-century invention, we offer a curiosity: there was a late medieval clavichord with metal tangents, and the ensemble’s keyboardist, David Catalunya, has such a piano reinvented, based on drawings and descriptions from the 1400s. This is the first album to use such an instrument. In addition to the lovely songs from the past, we are especially proud of the totally new songs that Eivind Buene has written for Currentes. His imaginative miniatures for medieval ensemble are recorded here for the first time.

Norwegian violinist Arvid Engegard and pianist Nils Anders Mortensen present Schumann’s Violin Sonatas Op. 105 and 121, and “Funf Stucke im Volkston” Op. 102. Schumann’s Violin Sonata Op. 105 was the first in the genre that the composer wrote. While he wasn’t necessarily pleased with the work, it was pleasantly received by audiences after its premiere by Clara Schumann and Ferdinand David in 1852, and remains a favorite of performers. His Violin Sonata Op. 121 was his second attempt at a vioin sonata, and was dedicated to violinist Ferdinand David. Norwegian musician Arvid Engegard performs worldwide as a violinist, a pianist, and a conductor. Engegard was educated in Norway, Austria, and in the US, and was strongly influenced by Sandor Vegh, director of “Camerata Academia” in Salzburg, where Arvid long served as soloist and concertmaster.

Sverre Indris Joner writes of this new release: “Orchestrating Argentine tango does present its challenges. One possible solution is to try to make the orchestra sound as much like a tango ensemble, an “orquesta tipica,” as possible. Another option is to cut a few corners and translate it into an easier language for the more conventional orchestra to ecipher. A third is to invent new, unfamiliar solutions. I’ve done a bit of all three here… I have certainly run the gamut of styles as a composer- everything from tango & salsa to waltz & pols (Norwegian folk dance), from electronica and hip hop to music for films, theatre and dance. With this orchestral album you’ll get an insight into my musical universe “with a certain hint of tango.”

Classical Music

With this release, LAWO Classics wishes to celebrate Brynjar Hoff’s 70 years as a musician. Hoff is a legend in Norwegian musical life. For years he was one of the country’s most active classical artists as a television and concert performer in Norway and abroad. He was also one of the few Norwegian musicians to both perform as soloist and record with the English Chamber Orchestra and London Philharmonic Orchestra. Brynjar Hoff is known for his beautiful tone and musicality, and in this collected release he reveals something of his repertoire, which covers almost everything from baroque to contemporary music. He is said to have introduced the oboe to Norwegians with his many radio and TV concerts. This release features old recordings with which we wish to show Brynjar Hoff’s development as a musician. We at LAWO Classics have put a lot of work into this release and hope that many music lovers will find delight in it in the years to come.

Christiania Mannskor was established in 2009 and is dedicated to the renewal and revitalization of men’s choir singing in Norway. The ensemble works closely with several of the country’s leading composers, and works with both old and new compositions for men’s choir in an attempt to make the genre more accessible to the people of Oslo and across the country. The group is made up of eighteen professional singers. “Something Blue” is the ensemble’s second recording of Norwegian music on the LAWO Classics label. Their first release, “Something New,” was the first in the series of what will be four albums and consists only of works by Norwegian composers written in the past twenty years.

It is truly in his songs that Faure reveals the flower of his genius, wrote the composer's former pupil Maurice Ravel. More than a hundred songs written over six decades made Faure perhaps the greatest master of the genre French "melodie." The present collection takes us on a journey from Faure's first song cycle, "Poeme d'un jour" to his last, "L'Horizon chimerique," via the exultant "La Bonne Chanson" and the intensely concentrated "Mirages." The songs have texts by French poets of Faure's time; here we find poems of Charles Grandmougin, Baronne de Brimont, Paul Verlaine and Jean de La Ville de Mirmont. "Mirages" concludes Bettina Smith's project for LAWO Classics of recording all of Gabriel Faure's cycles for voice and piano. It was preceded in this series by Fetes Galantes and "Serres Chaudes," both together with pianist Einar Rottingen. Together they have also released "Voices of Women" with songs of Fartein Valen, Jostein Stalheim and Ketil Hvoslef, composers from Norway's west coast.

Classical Music

Classical Music

Eugene Asti writes of this new release: "When I was trying to decide which solo pieces to record, I felt drawn to the late piano works as they seemed in some way related to his songs. Brahms's Lieder are some of his most intimate and personal compositions, and although small in scale, there is a wealth of emotional depth and poetic sensibility to be explored in them. The exact same thing can be said of the late piano works, which are likewise small in dimension and certainly not composed as virtuosic showpieces. They are also among the most beautiful and profound of all his works, possessing a truly vocal quality with which, as a song pianist, I can immediately identify (some could almost be called 'songs without words'). In the making of this recording, I was very fortunate that LAWO chose a wonderful reconditioned Steinway D dating from 1893, which is just a year after the composition of these late piano pieces." Eugene Asti is one of the foremost accompanists of his generation, and regularly tours and records as a solo musician. His many recordings have garnered him widespread critical acclaim.