Lars-Erik LARSSON
(1908 - 1986)
Kyssande wind
Fôr vilsna fötter sjunger
gräset
Skyn, blomman och en lärka
Textes de Hjalmar Gullberg)
Hugo ALFVÉN
(1872-1960)
Pioner - Anders Österling
Saa tag mit Hjerte - Tove Ditlevsen
Gösta NYSTROEM
(1890 - 1966)
Pa reveln - Anders Österling
Otrolig dag - Einar Malm
Havet sjunger - Ebba Lindqvist
Ture RANGSTRÖM
(1884 - 1947)
En gammal dansrytm - Bo Bergman
En enda stunden - Johan Ludwig Runeberg
Gustaf NORDQVIST
(1886 - 1949)
Sipporna - Karl Gustav Ossiannilsson
Jag ville vara t°arar - Erik Blomberg
Till havs - Jonatan Reuter
Gunnar de FRUMERIE
(1908 - 1987)
Hjärtats sånger opus 27 :
- När du sluter mina ögon
- Det blir vackert där du g°ar
- Saliga väntan - Ur djupet av
min själ - Du är min Afrodite
- Som en v°ag (Pär Lagerkvist)
Bo LINDE
(1933 - 1970)
Den ängen där du kysste mig
- Viola Renvall
Äppelträd och päronträd
- Erik Blomberg
Tor AULIN
(1866 - 1914)
Och riddaren for üsti österland
- August Strindberg
Fyra serbiska folks°anger: (Johan Ludvig
Runeberg) - Till en ros - Vinter i hjertat
- Hvad vill jag? - Domen
Gunnar de FRUMERIE
(1908 - 1987)
Nu är det sommarmorgon - Pär
Lagerkvist
Ture RANGSTRÖM
(1884 - 1947)
Serenad - Bo Bergman
Sköldmön - Karin Boye
Bo LINDE (1933-1970)
Är jag intill döden trött
Är det dyn akkra käraste barn
Tag mig
May we be happy
(Harriett Löwenhjelm)
FOR MORE INFORMATION
ABOUT VON OTTER
http://www.deutschegrammophon.com/special/?ID=vonotter-watercolours
Anne Sofie Von Otter
is something of an emissary for Swedish
song. Her wider fame has given her a
credibility that no amount of special
pleading could replicate. Her vocal
virtues come ideally into play in this
repertoire. Von Otter’s tone is steady
of emission and she has an obvious intelligence
coupled with a warm communicative humanity.
We know Larsson
for his set of miniature concertos
and the Liten-Serenade. Here
however we have three songs, from nine,
setting the verse of Hjalmar Gullberg.
The range runs from the robustly brusque
and gusty Kiss of the Wind to
the more impressionistic and ecstatic
The Grass Sings under the Feet -
part Nystroem, part Fauré. The
cloud, the flower and the Lark,
in its skittering flight, recalls
the playful songs of Mary Plumstead
decorated with the icy filigree of Bengt
Forsberg's piano.
Peonies is surprisingly
sturdy for Alfvén and
the language surprised me. This is a
grave and strange song about the talk
of the flowers. Pierrot is cold
and glinting. Take my heart is
more like the Alfvén we know
with its Tchaikovskian romance - lovingly
ardent.
Nystroem's Three
Songs will inevitably touch on the
sea. On the reef juxtaposes butterflies
and the sea. The 'shore of eternity'
is magically communicated by the piano
with the eternal chime of the surf and
the glister of the sun-flecked sea.
The sing-song of Amazing Day recalls,
in its cantilena, Michael Head's
best songs. Finally The Song of the
Sea relates to the Sinfonia Del
Mare. It too is a setting of Ebba
Lindqvist (1908-1995). With its Finzian
melodic 'fall' it is the best song here;
a prize alongside the Alfvén
Saa tag mit Hjerte.
Then to Rangström.
In En gammal dansrytm (An
Old Dance) dance is a metaphor for
sex - a joining together in pure delight.
Von Otter relishes the song with glinting
and devilish abandon. By contrast in
En enda stunden (A moment
in time) it is melancholy that is
in the ascendancy carried by a slow
tolling cantilena. A man and
woman pass by; there could have been
something between them yet they do not
stop; the moment has passed.
Gustaf Nordqvist
is a lesser known composer than
all the others here. Sipporna (The
Anemones) has the flowers playfully
serenaded in nursery rhyme simplicity.
However this pristine emotional world
is left behind for the tragic sorrow
of Jag ville vara tårar. Till
havs (On the sea) has a Rachmaninovian
torment and is remarkable for the triumph
of the sung text on: ‘When the sea is
singing green and white / Its loud song
of freedom.’
We know Gunnar de
Frumerie from his orchestral music
and not so long ago several of his concertos
were recorded on Caprice. His six Hjärtats
sånger (Songs of the heart)
are full of touching moments and emotional
shading. The settings are variously
peace filled and alive with honeyed
chiming and noonday sweetness. From
the depths of my soul is more mournful
and reflective - a magical song. You
are my Afrodite has about it the
urgency of the ocean foam and its irresistible
currents. The final song is also very
much akin to Nystroem in its oceanic
romance.
Bo Linde adds
some modest dissonance in the midst
of this overflowing sentiment. In
Äppelträd och päronträd
there is, not surprisingly, a more
pastoral touch and a hint of the warmth
and honey of the Canteloube Auvergnat
songs. Tor Aulin, from a more
distant generation, uses a Schubertian
palette in recounting the Strindberg
text describing a knight who rode to
the Holy Land. Aulin’s four Serbian
Songs set texts adapted by Runeberg.
To A Rose conveys a rare mood
in its constant fast piano chime: the
anger of the woman separated from her
lover. Housman-like country lovers’
passions and the playfulness and petulance
of girls and cleverly flirting boys
are in play throughout these four songs.
Back to De Frumerie
for Nu är det sommarmorgon
setting Pär Lagerkvist reflecting
the optimism and strength invoked by
in its by a bright summer morning. One
can imagine Housman’s ploughman lad
empathising with this. In the annals
of Scandinavian song this one belongs
amongst the laurel-wreathed. Nothing
here is avant-garde - late romantic
with a gentle measure of dissonance.
Rangström’s
Serenade is a song of moonlight
romance and the love of the old for
the young. His Sköldmön
is something of a Straussian scena;
a militaristic tempestuous song of troll-slaying
and death in heroic deeds.
Lastly come four songs
by Bo Linde. I am tired to
Death is notable for its blanched
skeletal tone. Is it you, is it you
most beloved child? has a chilling
embrace with its theme of child bereavement
of meeting the dead child and of listening
for the beloved heartbeat. This and
the other Linde songs have a wandering
tonality that reminded me of my first
encounter with this composer’s music:
a 1977 broadcast of his Violin Concerto
played by Karl-Ove Mannberg. Take
me take me (Tag mig) is a
song of death and the expectation of
death - tender but bleak. Finally a
song to which the words are in English:
May we be happy has a Finzi-Hardy
message: ending with the words ‘But
tired and smiling we leave our toys
when it’s over and life is done.’ Gloomy?
A little, which we expect from this
repertoire - but in fact the performance
and the music deliver a quiet consummation
of great beauty and a sense of old peace
found anew. Congratulations to all concerned
for having the courage to end the recital
on a valedictory down-beat. It works!
These are magical songs
magically communicated by both artists.
It is a privilege to have access to
such a well-chosen and artfully, yet
naturally, interpreted anthology.
Rob Barnett
RELATED RELEASE
Anne Sofie Von Otter
Wings in the Night: Swedish Songs by
Hugo Alfvén · Sigurd von Koch
. Wilhelm Peterson-Berger . Ture Rangström
· Emil Sjögren . Wilhelm Stenhammar
Wilhelm PETERSON-BERGER
"Fridolins visor": Svensk Lyrik II,
Hft. 1 No.5: Intet är som väntanstider
(Karlfeldt) [01:50]
"Fyra visor i svensk folkton" op.5
No.1: När jag för mig själv
[01:55]
No.3: Som stjärnorna på himmelen
[03:40]
Sigurd von KOCH
I månaden Tjaitra (Sigurd Agrell)
Minns du våren [02:55]
Af lotusdoft och månens sken (Sigurd
Agrell) Exotisk serenade [01:04]
Wilhelm PETERSON-BERGER
Visor och stämningar, op.26
No.1: Vandaren "Här ur mossiga
klippans famn" (Vilhelm Ekelund) [01:49]
No.5: Det far ett skepp (Bergman) [01:34]
No.4: Jungfru Blond och jungfru Brunett
(Bergman) [03:36]
No.9: En strandvisa "Är det ljuft
att sköljas" (Fröding) [02:37]
Ture RANGSTRÖM
Vingar i natten ("Det flyger en fågel
svart") [01:15]
Afskedet ("År af skumma färder
fick du pröfva") [01:57]
Pan ("Middagsstillhet och klöverånga")
[02:29]
Wilhelm PETERSON-BERGER
"Marits visor": 3 dikter ur "En glad
gut" av B. Bjørnson, op.12
No.1: Kom bukken til gutten [01:16]
No.2: Solen skinner vakkert om kvaelden
[01:33]
No.3: Holder du af mig [03:02]
Sigurd von KOCH
De Vilda Svanarna
Vårnattsregnet ("Det ljuva milda
vårnattsregnet") (Bethge [Thun-Fu])
[03:24]
Människans lott ("På sommarns
värme") (Bethge [Khong-Fu-Tse/Confucius])
[02:56]
De vilda svanarna ("Ack, ännu synes
icke") (Bethge [Ly-Y-Han]) [02:01]
Hugo ALFVÉN
7 dikter, op.28 [Rudén 63] (Thiel)
No.6: Skogen sover [02:54]
No.3: Jag kysser din vita hand [04:39]
Karl Wilhelm
Eugen STENHAMMAR
4 Dikter av Verner von Heidenstam, op.37
(von Heidenstam)
No.2: I lönnens skymning [02:23]
No.1: Jutta kommer till Folkungarna
("Det red en jungfru från Danemark")
[01:26]
Ture RANGSTRÖM
Gammalsvenskt ("Skytteln skall gå
och väfstoln slå") [02:36]
Melodi ("Bara du går öfver
markerna") [01:32]
Bön till natten ("Slut är
dagens") [02:55]
Wilhelm PETERSON-BERGER
"Fridolins lustgård": Svensk Lyrik
II, Hft. 2 (Karlfeld)
No.4: Böljeby-vals ("Sjung, sjung
i alarna") [02:59]
"Offerkransar": Svensk Lyrik III, Hft.2
(Österling)
No.2: Återkomst ("Så kom
den stillhet åter") [02:07]
Emil SJÖGREN
6 Lieder aus Julius Wolff's Tannhäuser,
op.12 (Wolff)
No.1: Du schaust mich an mit stummen
Fragen [03:49]
No.4: Hab' ein Röslein Dir gebrochen
[01:17]
No.6: Ich möchte schweben über
Tal und Hügel [02:36]
Wilhelm PETERSON-BERGER
"Fridolins lustgård": Svensk Lyrik
II, Hft. 2 (Karlfeld)
No.5: Aspåkers-polska ("Varför
sitta vi så still") [01:29]
Anne-Sofie von Otter, mezzo-soprano
Bengt Forsberg, piano
DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON 449 189-2 [73:35]
Anne Sofie Von Otter (mezzo) 
