Millom Rosor – Edvard Grieg Songs

A project of passion!

Recorded in Grieg’s villa,
Troldhaugen, on Grieg’s own Steinway Model B from 1892 

The songs of Edvard Grieg have
always been among his most beloved compositions, for Grieg himself, and for
performers and listeners. The 170 songs he wrote spring from deep personal
inspiration, and they were always dedicated to or inspired by close personal
relations or great poetry.

We wanted to record Edvard
Grieg’s music in Grieg’s own villa and on his own lovely piano. In selecting
which songs would work well together on this CD we followed intuition and mood.
We were invited by the Edvard Grieg Museum to record the songs which make up
his opus 48. The poems are taken from several authors, and the texts are all in
German. Opus 26 with poems of Johan Paulsen, and opus 39, with different
Norwegian poets represented, offer the complete spectrum from the joys of love
to the deepest sorrow humans can experience—the loss of a child. The Steinway
grand from the 1890s provides the intimacy of tone called for by the texts.

This recording was made during
a few cold January days. The songs were assembled and arranged far from
festivals and spring birches. While they were being recorded, the efforts to
muffle the sounds of the winter storm and wooden house were gradually modified
into an encounter with that which Grieg himself had discovered to be
inspiring—a lovely house, the beauty of nature, and the essence of the moment
that a song  can impart. Moreover, we
were able to avail ourselves of the composer’s own instrument: a magnificent
old Steinway grand with its characteristic timbre— dark, deep, and round, and
at the same time bright and clear in the treble. A grand piano built for this
intimate setting and concert experience.