Many have now probably heard of Norway’s new opera star, Lise Davidsen. She won no less than three important international singing competitions in 2015, and has since sung on many of the world’s biggest opera stages.
She is best known for singing Wagner, not least at the prestigious Wagner Festival in Bayreuth in southern Germany. NRK has already made two documentaries about her, one on TV and one on radio.
But here is a raw tip from Rikskringkastingen: Lise Davidsen is as good as a romance singer. Together with pianist Leif Ove Andsnes, she has made an album with songs by Edvard Grieg that will remain as a classic for many years to come.
Romance = poems + music
Most people associate Grieg with his «Lyrical pieces» for piano, the extremely popular piano concerto in A minor, and not least the music for «Peer Gynt», with megahits such as «Morgenstemning», «Dovregubbens hall» and «Anitra’s dans».
Another raw tip from Rikskringkastingen: Edvard Grieg is just as good, if not even better, as a romance composer.
A “romance” is thus a setting of a poem, usually for a single singing voice and piano. Romance is also called “songs”, “songs” or “melodies” – dear children have many names.
Edvard Grieg composed about 170 romances during his career as a composer. In fact, about a third of Grieg’s published works are romance collections. Little of this repertoire is known outside the borders of the fatherland, for one obvious reason: the language barrier.
Grieg’s romance (pun intended) with the romance genre was undoubtedly due to his remarkable ability to create lyrical moods in the short format, with accurate melodies, catchy rhythms and innovative harmonies.
GRIEGS FIRST HIT: “I love you!” from «The Melodies of the Heart», Op. 5.
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However, it was also due to Grieg’s highly human romance with his cousin, the singer Nina Hagerup. In a letter from 1900, Grieg writes: «I loved a young girl with a wonderful voice, and with an equally wonderful lecture. (…) My songs arose with the necessity of a law of nature and were all written for her.»
The composer married the gifted girl in 1867, who then got her more famous name: Nina Grieg. Blessed was he who heard Mrs. Grieg sing “I love You!” or «Solveig’s Song» with the husband at the piano.
ROMANCE: Nina and Edvard Grieg shared the joy of music.
Foto: PUBLIC DOMAIN / WIKIMEDIA COMMONS
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Grieg chose lyrics from a number of the leading poets of his time for his songs, with Bjørnson, Vinje, Ibsen and Garborg as obvious examples. Of course, much of this is “national romance,” a term nowadays rarely used in educated circles without distancing imitations.
But nation cultivation or not: It is difficult to get away from the fact that Grieg’s songs are some of the best Norwegian music history has to offer. A cross-section of them, excellently interpreted, can be found on the new album with Lise Davidsen and Leif Ove Andsnes.
A unique voice
HIGHLIGHT: Lise Davidsen shows herself as a true romance artist in «Meeting», the fourth of the songs from Grieg’s «Haugtussa».
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Lise Davidsen’s distinctive qualities as a romance singer are already revealed in the album’s opening work: Grieg’s “Haugtussa” Op. 67. This setting of eight poems from Arne Garborg’s masterpiece about Veslemøy, the psychic young shepherd girl from Jæren, is considered by many, and for good reasons, to be the greatest song cycle by a Nordic composer.
Grieg threw himself into Garborg’s cycle of poems immediately after its publication in May 1895, and wrote excitedly in a letter that the poems are already music – «you only need to write it down». Garborg heard the songs a few years later, and wrote enthusiastically to Grieg: «It is precisely this deep, soft and subdued, this underground music, which I in my own way sought to sing into words and verses, but which you have captured.»
An “underground” music requires special qualities in the performer, and if there is one thing that characterizes Lise Davidsen, it is just that. One thing is the tone of voice itself, which is both dark and sparkling at the same time. Another thing is the enormous range of expression that Davidsen has at his disposal, from the ecstatic and outward-looking in “Blåbær-Li” to the low-key fervor in “Veslemøy” and “Vond dag”.
Perhaps it can be objected that Davidsen’s voice sometimes becomes too large and powerful for a female figure that Garborg describes as “trembling sped and weak”. But the forces that ravage Veslemøy’s interior are by no means weak, despite her young age. And it is precisely the still “young” in Davidsen’s voice that makes her interpretation of these songs something completely her own. I am most impressed by how simple and expressive Davidsen sings in the weaker parts, with perfect control over vibrato and voice. She shows herself here as a true romance artist.
HERRING: «Ved Gjætle-Bekken» from «Haugtussa», Op. 67.
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Then it is of course time to mention that there is another musician here who has a finger in the pie, literally. Leif Ove Andsnes captures all nuances in Lise Davidsen’s voice, at the same time as he brushes out Grieg’s piano movement in clear and pure colors. A striking example is “Ved Gjætle-Bekken”, the concluding (and longest) song in “Haugtussa”, with its “wild and herringbone” figures in the piano. Andsnes manages to give every harmonious turn in Grieg a new timbre, at the same time as the music ripples as naturally and unartfully as Garborg’s stream.
At home in German
Not surprisingly, Davidsen and Andsnes have chosen to record Griegs «Sechs Lieder» Op. 48 (composed 1884-89), which are the only Grieg novels that have become part of the international standard repertoire. The reason for this is again obvious: Grieg chooses here German-language texts by giants such as Heine, Goethe and Walther von der Vogelweide. In addition, it should be said that these six songs nicely match “Haugtussa” as one of the most beautiful from Grieg’s work list.
NOTE: Grieg’s setting of Geibel’s “Dereinst, Gedanke mein”, Op. 28.
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Take for example da wonderful “Dereinst, Gedanke mein” to lyrics by Emanuel Geibel, one of the most answered moments in Grieg’s music ever. The way Davidsen and Andsnes shape this is deathly longing the song on, with small and subtle nuances in phrasing, tempo, timbre and articulation, is simply unbearably beautiful. It shows that Davidsen is probably as much at home in the German-language as in the Norwegian.
For the rest of the album, Lise Davidsen has selected a bunch of Grieg’s most famous songs. Here you will find, among other things, brilliant versions of classics such as “I love you!”, “By the Rounds” and “Spring”.
COSMOPOLITAN: Grieg’s five songs (Opus 69) to lyrics by Otto Benzon.
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More unusual is that Davidsen chooses to incorporate Grieg’s “5 Poems” Op. 69 (1900) to text by Otto Benzon, one of Grieg’s less frequently performed opus. Grieg himself described these songs as more cosmopolitan in expression. They thus constitute a nice contrast to “Haugtussa” and the songs with lyrics by Ibsen and Vinje. Although these songs sound less characteristic “Greek”, it is still exciting music, a couple of them almost orchestral in expression. Andsnes is shown here his distinctive ability to color with a wide brush without losing the clarity of the lines.
Grieg-sanger ftw!
Decca has this time succeeded far better than last time in creating a sound production that does Davidsen’s voice justice. The balance between voice and piano is good, and the recording has a sufficient sense of space without compromising the experience of closeness to the performers. The piano sound tends towards the bright and brilliant, which balances nicely against Davidsen’s dark and full voice.
“Edvard Grieg” is Lise Davidsen’s third solo album on Decca, and the most solid so far. At the present time, it must without a doubt be said to be the album you go to if you want a well-curated selection of Grieg’s romance production.
Not without reason, Davidsen and Andsnes adorn the front page of the January issue of Gramophone magazine under the headline “The Power of Grieg”.
At the moment, I can think of no better communicator of the power of Grieg’s music than just these two.
All reviews and recommendations from NRK can be found at nrk.no/anmeldelser.
Further recommended:
Lise Davidsen from Stokke is called «the voice of the century». She broke through in 2019 in New York, London and Wagner’s festival house in Bayreuth. But who is she?
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