Pehr Henrik Nordgren 1944-2008

Started by vandermolen, September 26, 2010, 10:23:24 AM

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CD

Oh I see. I don't know what your "setup" is like but I've always ripped my CDs to computer and listened with headphones on my iPod.

The new erato

Quote from: Corey on September 29, 2010, 05:01:16 PM
Oh I see. I don't know what your "setup" is like but I've always ripped my CDs to computer and listened with headphones on my iPod.
To each his own I guess and of course one can edit all one want (if that is what one wants from buying a CD); doesn't preclude this from being the most cumbersome and illogical CD layout I've ever seen. I've got 30.000 $ + of equipment in my main rig and playing from a PC (while in general not a bad idea if I could be bothered to rip, organize and backup all those files) into headphones is very far from my priorities.

CD

Yeah, I thought it was annoying to have a single piece separated across two discs (one that isn't of Mahlerian or Late-Feldmanesque length, that is :D), but this really makes no sense, but it could be a typo — I've just checked and the copy I downloaded has the tracks in the correct order.

CD

Now if I could only find those string quartets!


snyprrr

Nordgren's Piano Quintet, Op.44 is...WOW!,... 20mins of the darkest, most poetic Nordic/Shostakovian lamenting. By turns spare and brutal, expressionist and lyrical, one of this PQ's outstanding features is Nordgren's use of 'bluesy' (not in the American sense) microtones. Is anyone else as impressed as I am? This is my first encounter with Nordgren.

Lethevich

I don't know how I managed to miss this thread first time around. I'm glad you came around to that disc with the 3rd and 5th symphonies, Jeffrey - if I recall correctly you were a little less enthusiastic on your initial listen? I must listen to this composer more closely, but there's so little time :-\
Peanut butter, flour and sugar do not make cookies. They make FIRE.

some guy

Hey snyprrr, what do you mean by "'bluesy' (not in the American sense)"? You've intrigued me with that!

Also with the rest of your description, of course. Enough to look for the quintet for my own self.

But any other sense of 'bluesy' other than American caught my eye in a different way.

snyprrr

Quote from: some guy on March 11, 2011, 11:34:56 AM
Hey snyprrr, what do you mean by "'bluesy' (not in the American sense)"? You've intrigued me with that!

Also with the rest of your description, of course. Enough to look for the quintet for my own self.

But any other sense of 'bluesy' other than American caught my eye in a different way.

Well, hmm,... on YouTube, for Xenakis's Cendrees, go to Part 2 (out of 3). There is a flute solo of sorts there, and I find it just so jazzy. I guess I'm saying that at a certain point in time, Composers were able to harness the power of sliding into notes better than ever before,... aaand, as good as the more,... er, indigenous types of emoting.

I guess Nordgren's sliding sounds more Japanese than Delta. He's playing a scale similar to that Xenakis Pelog scale (but, more Northern ???, whatever that means: Nordgren has a very unique Tone), and sliding in and out of a beautiful melody,... the overall effect for me is a Viking/ancient Japan feeling,... very Conan the Barbarian, but in the best sense possible (try not to see Arnie),... perhaps Magnus Magnusson, if you know who that is (a writer). I know this is terrible, haha!! The point is, it has that deeply 'felt' feeling written into the music, I believe.

Yes, I made the Xenakis/Conan/Memphis connection!! :o oy ::)

Mirror Image

#29
Quote from: vandermolen on September 26, 2010, 10:23:24 AM
I was curious about this Finnish composer as I noticed that he wrote the music for many Ingmar Bergman films, including my favourite 'The Seventh Seal'. [Added later - I got this totally wrong as it was Erik Nordgren who wrote the Bergman soundtracks  :-\] I found a second hand Ondine CD (withdrawn from the Kansas City music library) of Nordgren's 3rd and 5th symphonies on Amazon UK.  These are very dark, uncompromising, tonal works which I found extremely gripping - a kind of bleak traversal of a shadowy wasteland. Lyrical sections are interrupted by extraordinary orchestral explosions and there are some very striking orchestral effects - the opening of Symphony No 5 for example. There is not much in the way of tunes (although Symphony No 5 has a 'Karelian lament' running through it which is oddly moving), but the atmosphere of both works I found held my attention throughout. There is a haunting quality to this music and a real sense of a dark journey taking place. His music does not really remind me of anyone else, although occasionally Allan Petterson came to mind. I'd be interested to hear of any other opinions of this challenging but worthwhile composer. The striking cover art of the CD is very appropriate I think.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pehr_Henrik_Nordgren

Honestly, I'm not too impressed with this composer. Listening to his Symphony No. 3, I thought I was listening to Allan Pettersson minus the lyrical moments that the best Pettersson works have. The music doesn't really sound like anything. Almost directionless, many of Pettersson's works have this meandering quality that I don't like either, but, at least, in Pettersson's strong works which I consider Symphonies Nos. 6-7 and his Violin Concerto No. 2 have points where the music is redeemed. This is just a first listen and I haven't heard anything else by the composer whom I understand composed a lot of orchestral works, especially for solo instruments, but only time will tell if I actually will want to investigate the composer further.

some guy

snyprrr, you know, I think that what you just said makes perfect sense. (And I hope that that's a good sign!)

snyprrr

Quote from: some guy on March 11, 2011, 11:45:22 PM
snyprrr, you know, I think that what you just said makes perfect sense. (And I hope that that's a good sign!)

Wow, major doom must be on the way! Duck and cover!! :o


snyprrr

Quote from: some guy on March 11, 2011, 11:45:22 PM
snyprrr, you know, I think that what you just said makes perfect sense. (And I hope that that's a good sign!)

Herr-hmmm ::) ;)

calyptorhynchus

There seems to be a lot of Nordgren on

http://www.classicsonline.com/  (mp3 downloads)

Including the string quartets disc mentioned before for $9.99.

I have one disc of his, Music for 19 Strings and Cello Concerto and I think it's very good. Might take the plunge with the SQs.
'Many men are melancholy by hearing music, but it is a pleasing melancholy that it causeth.' Robert Burton

snyprrr

Quote from: calyptorhynchus on January 17, 2013, 08:29:20 PM
There seems to be a lot of Nordgren on

http://www.classicsonline.com/  (mp3 downloads)

Including the string quartets disc mentioned before for $9.99.

I have one disc of his, Music for 19 Strings and Cello Concerto and I think it's very good. Might take the plunge with the SQs.

His name constantly calls me to try... something. SQs? Cello Concerto? Symphonies?


calyptorhynchus

Well, I downloaded the SQs disk as MP3s (SQs 10 and 11) and I think they're very good. if you like tonal, modern music, these are for you. A little less astringent than Simpson, perhaps more like David Matthews. A little influence from Japanese music in places. Give it a go!
'Many men are melancholy by hearing music, but it is a pleasing melancholy that it causeth.' Robert Burton

snyprrr

Quote from: calyptorhynchus on January 18, 2013, 09:01:06 PM
Well, I downloaded the SQs disk as MP3s (SQs 10 and 11) and I think they're very good. if you like tonal, modern music, these are for you. A little less astringent than Simpson, perhaps more like David Matthews. A little influence from Japanese music in places. Give it a go!

I enjoyed those samples today.

Nordgren is one of the darkest Composers ever, if we limit that to a Romantic Darkness, such as DSCH or Mahler or whatever. Nordgren seems forever writing music of post-apocalyptic angst, always brooding, and not particularly violent. 8 or 9 Symphonies, 4 Violins Concertos and 3 Cello Concertos (I think), 11 SQs, it's almost too much! And yes, EXPENSIVE!!

vandermolen

#38
Have been listening to Symphony 7 (2003) having recently received this CD. It is a most extraordinary score and I have played it through several times over the last few days. To me it is a searching and visionary work, which starts out very much in the spirit of Rautavaara. It is a very dark work, with sombre episode interspersed with folk type songs which reminded me of a British sea shanty! Charles Ives also came to mind with the seemingly bizarre juxtapositions of dissonant and lyrical material. I am delighted to have discovered this remarkable score and have not even got on yet to Nordgren's last symphony, the No.8 of 2006.
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http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/pehr-henrik-nordgren-modernist-composer-who-incorporated-folk-music-into-his-work-and-relished-his-artistic-freedom-961316.html
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

Daverz

Some interesting comments by Ronald E. Grames in the last Fanfare about a disc with his Clarinet Concerto

QuoteOne can hear Nordgren's energetic, assertive, often disjointed, unsettling, and occasionally ominous voice developing in these two works of his early career. The musical personality would become more focused, the folk-inspired elements more a part of the fabric, the canvasses more austere and forbidding, and he would move even further away from the Modernist trends of his fellow composers. Arguably, he became less odd over time, though he was always very much his own person. He was rarely more compelling than here. One can hear the influence of Ligeti in the textures of these darkly enigmatic works, and Shostakovich in their emotional structure and outbursts of sardonic humor. There has not been a composer who put these and other influences together in quite the way eclectic, iconoclastic, Pehr Henrik Nordgren has done. The writing is virtuosic both in its impressive emotional sweep and in the demands on the orchestra and soloists. The folk instruments in the clarinet concerto—a jouhikko (a bowed harp), a kantele (a dulcimer), and an accordion—are a haunting counterpoint to the more massive orchestral discourse. There is never a dull moment, but perhaps more than a few perplexing ones. What does it all mean? One does not always know, but it's fascinating to listen.

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