Celebrating the First Edition of Agathe Backer Grøndahl’s Piano Music

I recently attended a reception and recital hosted by H.E. Tore Hattrem, Ambassador of Norway in the UK, and Mrs Marit Gjelten, together with Faber Music and Kode Art Museums & Composers Homes to celebrate the first ever Urtext edition of Fantasistykker (Fantasy Pieces) Op. 39 and I Blaafjellet (In the Blue Mountain) Op. 44 by Norwegian composer Agathe Backer Grøndahl. The exclusive event took place at the Ambassador’s residence in London, an elegant mansion opposite Kensington Palace.

Agathe Backer Grøndahl

Agathe Backer Grøndahl (1847-1907) was a Norwegian pianist, composer and music teacher. She studied with Franz Liszt and Hans von Bülow, amongst others, and was a contemporary and close friend of Edvard Grieg. She wrote over 400 works, mainly for piano and voice, and, like Grieg’s, her music blends Norwegian folk elements with Romantic influences. The English writer and music critic George Bernard Shaw described her as one of the foremost pianists in Europe, and at the time of her death in 1907, she was hailed as one of the great names of Norway’s musical heritage. Yet, over the following years, her music was overshadowed by her famous compatriot and has remained relatively unknown until now.

The music was performed by Christian Grøvlen, who gave some fascinating insights into Backer Grøndahl’s life and her compositional output. Although these works can be defined as “salon pieces”, they display an intriguing range of styles, textures and musical colours – at times impressionistic or nodding towards Bartokian folk idioms and dance rhythms; at other times, energetic, virtuosic and sweepingly Romantic, with a depth of emotion that goes far beyond the salon miniature.

Agathe Backer Grøndahl: 10 Fantasistykker, Op. 39 – No. 1. Souvenir (Sara Aimée Smiseth, piano)

Agathe Backer Grøndahl’s In the Blue Mountain

The Fantasy pieces resemble Grieg’s Lyric Pieces, yet they can also be seen as tone paintings with their programmatic titles (Summer Night, In the Boat, Bird’s Winter Song, for example). And while beauty and charm may lie on the surface of these pieces with their elegance and decorativeness, there is smouldering darkness beneath – and this is the core of Agathe Backer Grøndahl’s music.

This darkness is more evident in the suite I Blaafjellet (In the Blue Mountain), one of Grøndahl’s major works, dedicated to her sister, the painter Harriet Backer. It owes something to the programmatic music of Liszt in that the suite takes the listener on a journey, not unlike the first year of Liszt’s Annees de Pelerinage. The ‘fairytale’ suite evokes the different moods of the magical mountains of Norway, replete with trolls and wood nymphs, and from the outset, despite the relatively calm opening piece ‘Night”, there is an unsettling sense that something is afoot…. The suite builds in intensity as the troll emerges from the mountain, heralded by portentous, almost aggressive chords and unnerving jazz-like rhythms.

Agathe Backer Grøndahl: I blaafjellet (In the Blue Mountains), Op. 44 – II. I Trollhallen (Sara Aimée Smiseth, piano)

Agathe Backer Grøndahl’s Fantasy Pieces

This was a splendid introduction to Backer Grøndahl’s piano music, characterfully performed by Christian Grøvlen, whose affection for and appreciation of it shone through every note.

The first-ever Urtext editions of two of Backer Grøndahl’s greatest piano works are published by the distinguished music publisher Edition Peters. Edited by Christian Grøvlen, they are based on the original manuscript and the first edition of 1898, which was out of print for many years. Now, in these new critical editions, the beauty and inventiveness of Backer Grøndahl’s writing for piano can be brought to a wider audience and enjoyed by pianists, professional and amateur alike.