Realising that it’s been almost a month since my last post was a bit of a shocker! In the intervening time, a lot has happened. Kristina från Duvemåla has finished, I have been to Norway and back, and last week I worked on Berwaldhallen’s final livestream of the year.
Last week, a packed Berwaldhallen saw the joint forces of the Swedish Radio Choir and Eric Ericson Chamber Choir, Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra and soloists Malena Ernman and Jennifer France, conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen, take on György Ligeti’s powerful Requiem.
It is not particularly long at about half an hour, but it is a daunting work, meticulously composed, with the chorus divided into 20 parts and plenty of divisions in the orchestra as well. At several points, more than one vocal line with lyrics runs simultaneously, and the thread passes like a relay between different parts – even from chorus to soloist and back, not only in between words but from one syllable to another!
Earlier this week, I finished a programme text for a concert next year featuring a very different requiem mass, that of Gabriel Fauré. Not only is it stylistically different, being composed in the late 19th century instead of right in the middle of the modernist 20th century, but Fauré’s Requiem sets a completely different tone to Ligeti’s.
Fauré intended for his Requiem to be hopeful and tender, focussed more on the promise of eternal rest rather than the fear of death. The ominous clusters and raw power conjured by Ligeti’s music is striking and emotionally potent in the opposite way. Stanley Kubrick’s film 2001: A Space Odyssey is frequently mentioned for borrowing Ligeti’s Requiem in its soundtrack, but I also want to mention Gareth Edwards’ excellent 2014 film Godzilla. Alexandre Desplat composed the main soundtrack – also excellent – to Godzilla, except for a striking scene in the latter half which is set to a part of Ligeti’s Requiem.
As a very quick side note, I want to express my strong disappointment in the fact that production company Legendary Pictures developed the 2014 Godzilla into yet another franchise of dumb action films.
Returning to last week’s concert in Berwaldhallen, another highlight was of course violinist extraordinaire Janine Jansen playing Sergei Prokofiev’s first violin concerto. Having the chance to observe her during rehearsals was also a treat, getting a small glimpse into the mental and physiological act of performing such a work. One or two times, she discussed the tempo with Esa-Pekka Salonen, altering it only slightly, at one point wishing to go not slower but faster! It seemed – or so I assume – that the phrases in that spot were easier to perform for her in that specific tempo, and that going even slightly below it simply threw her off.
During the concert, only a few minutes in, one of the strings on Jansen’s violin snapped! Everyone quickly stopped playing and she, with a slightly hurried smile, chased off stage only to reappear a few minutes later with a complete set of strings on her precious instrument. She proceeded to play the whole work with gusto, all strings still attached.
The concert – which also included two compositions by the conductor himself, Esa-Pekka Salonen – is available to watch on Berwaldhallen Play for 30 days after its original broadcast date, so January 4th, 2026. And if you’d rather just listen to the music, head over to Swedish Radio P2.
Before Berwaldhallen, I spent five days in Fagernes in Norway working with my dear friends in the vocal ensemble Kurve for their Christmas concert. They had three concerts planned – two on a Sunday and one the following Monday – with an all-day workshop-rehearsal on the Saturday before. A tight but workable schedule.
Every time before that I have worked directly with Kurve, I mostly assisted their regular conductor. This time, though, they were between conductors, so they relied on me to take the reins for the final sprint! I knew this already, of course, but it was still an interesting challenge to join their process toward the end like this, not knowing in advance what I could do with the short time I had or what they needed the most of me.
In addition, one of the choir’s soloists, who is also their beatboxer, texted the choir’s director early Sunday morning – the morning of the first two concerts – that he and his wife were in the hospital because she was going into labour several weeks earlier than scheduled. I then had to spend Sunday morning frantically going over the concert programme, finding alternatives to our now-missing key player. Together, I and the director managed to solve everything, splitting solo and rhythm parts up between other singers – I even took one of the solos myself – and we ended up being able to perform the entire programme without cuts and with our heads held high.
My role in the concert was conducting the ensemble, but also to sing a personal favourite – Adolphe Adam’s Cantique de Noël, also known by its English name O Holy Night, or in Swedish, O helga natt. Even though I have sung it many, many times at this point I still really like it.
Another unexpected event in Norway was when the choir’s director texted me again around lunchtime Monday that NRK, the Norwegian public service broadcaster, wanted to do a short TV interview with her and me ahead of the last concert that night. I was more nervous about that interview than the concert! I think handled myself pretty well, though. You’ll get more out of watching the interview if you understand Norwegian or Swedish, but here it is, nevertheless; the segment about Kurve begins at 09’12”.
The next major thing on my schedule is spelled B-A-C-H. More specifically, I will be singing the first three parts of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Christmas Oratorio twice in seven days with two different choirs and conductors! First, this Sunday at Härnösand Cathedral with conductor Per Brudsten and the Cathedral Choir, and then once more a week from today, next Wednesday at Tonhallen in Sundsvall with conductor Erik Westberg and his eponymous vocal ensemble. It is a treat to get to perform such wonderful music twice in short succession, although it is a bit of a shame to not get to sing the latter half of the work, as well.
Before Christmas – probably next week – I will finally publish the first of the two follow-up posts about the composition of my Rhapsody for oboe, bassoon and piano that I also promised to write back in November. I aim to have both follow-ups finished and posted here before the end of the year, although I know myself better than to make any promises that I might end up regretting later…