Edvard Grieg - Sigurd Jorsalfar (Ole Kristian Ruud)

Information

Composer: Edvard Grieg

1. Sigurd Jorsalfar, incidental music, Op. 22: I. Introduction to Act I
2. Sigurd Jorsalfar, incidental music, Op. 22: II. Borghild's Dream
3. Sigurd Jorsalfar, incidental music, Op. 22: III. At the Matching Game
4. Sigurd Jorsalfar, incidental music, Op. 22: IV. The Northland Folk
5. Sigurd Jorsalfar, incidental music, Op. 22: V. Homage March
6. Sigurd Jorsalfar, incidental music, Op. 22: VI. Interlude I
7. Sigurd Jorsalfar, incidental music, Op. 22: VII. Interlude II
8. Sigurd Jorsalfar, incidental music, Op. 22: VIII. The King's Song
9. Land Sighting, Op. 31
10. Bergliot, melodrama, Op. 42
11. Funeral March in Memory of Rikard Nordraak
12. The Mountain Thrall, Op. 32

Håkan Hagegård, baritone (4, 7, 9 ,12)
Gørild Mauseth, narrator (10)
Bergen Philharmonic Choir (4, 8, 9)
Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra
Ole Kristian Ruud, conductor

Date: 2003
Label: BIS
http://bis.se/conductors/ruud-ole-kristian/grieg-sigurd-jorsalfar

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Review

ARTISTIC QUALITY: 10 / SOUND QUALITY: 10

If, based on his most popular pieces, you've come to the conclusion that Grieg was something of a musical wimp, then you really need to hear this sensational disc. The Funeral March for Rikard Nordraak offers about eight minutes of orchestral Sturm und Drang as intense as anything by Berlioz or Mahler; and as recorded here it sounds like a tone poem of Jon Leifs, with earth-shaking percussion and cataclysmic brass. The melodrama Bergliot also deserves to be better known. Now technically "melodrama" merely means spoken dialog over music, but narrator Gorild Mauseth, who quite appropriately recites the text like a paranoid schizophrenic madwoman who just went off her meds, must be aware of the more popular definition of the term, and she makes this one of Grieg's major achievements and a truly gripping listening experience.

Hakan Hagegard provides an equally impressive contribution to The Mountain Thrall (Den Bergtekne) and Landkjenning (Land Sighting), and he swaggers heroically in the Sigurd Jorsalfar songs that flesh out the more popular suite. Long eclipsed by the popularity of Peer Gynt, this earlier incidental work also reveals Grieg as a composer of ebullience and real backbone, especially when the great Homage March gets a "pedals to the metal" reading such as this. I can't imagine finer interpretations than those offered by conductor Ole Kristian Ruud and a clearly energized Bergen Philharmonic. Sonically this production features demonstration quality both in stereo and SACD multi-channel formats, and it's good to report that (unlike earlier issues in this series) BIS seems to have figured out how to make surround sound recordings that lose nothing in dynamic range or impact. Stunning! [7/30/2004]

-- David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday

More reviews:
BBC Music Magazine  PERFORMANCE: **** / SOUND: ****
http://www.musicweb-international.com/classRev/2004/July04/Grieg_Jorsalfar.htm

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Edvard Grieg (15 June 1843, Bergen – 4 September 1907, Bergen) was a Norwegian composer and pianist. He is widely considered one of the leading Romantic era composers, and his music is part of the standard classical repertoire worldwide. His use and development of Norwegian folk music in his own compositions put the music of Norway in the international spectrum. He is the most celebrated person from the city of Bergen, with numerous statues depicting his image, and many cultural entities named after him
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edvard_Grieg

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Ole Kristian Ruud (born 2 October 1958, Lillestrøm) is a Norwegian conductor. He studied clarinet with Richard Kjelstrup at the Norwegian Academy of Music, and studied conducting at the Sibelius Academy. Ruud was principal conductor of the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra, Norrköping Symphony Orchestra and Stavanger Symphony Orchestra. He has been professor of conducting at the Norwegian Academy of Music since 1999. In 2005, he completed recording the complete orchestral works of Grieg with the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra, for BIS records.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ole_Kristian_Ruud

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