TVEITT: 100 Hardanger Tunes - Suites Nos. 1 and 4

Engeset, Bjarte, Royal Scottish National Orchestra

8.555078

Tveitt’s musical outlook was steeped in the Hardanger music of western Norway. Even though almost 80 per cent of his output was destroyed in a fire, he can almost rival Milhaud. Niels Viggo Bentzon or Villa-Lobos in fecundity. The Fourth Suite of Hardanger Tunes was the first Tveitt work to be recorded on LP, way back in the 1960s, albeit in a much less complete form than it is here. Try ‘So stilt dei ror på glitre-fjord’ (How silently they row on the glittering fjord), and you will understand why Tveitt enjoyed such an enviable reputation as an orchestrator. His sound world is highly original and imaginative, and unfailingly inventive. Each of these suites comprises fifteen numbers, which some way fond too much of a good thing, and there is something to be said for making one’s own shorter compilations.
The Royal Scottish National Orchestra play with evident enthusiasm for Bjarte Engeset, who was collated the various different sources in preparing his edition. Nearly all these pieces are delightful and many are quite captivating. The second selection is every bit as imaginative and colourful as the earlier sets. Something of a find.

Prillar refers to the Norwegian folk instrument, the Prillarhorn, and is very much in his post-Greig nationalist vein. The second movement is distinctly Gallic and the piece was actually given in Paris in 1983 by the Orchestre National under Manuel Rosentahl. Decent performances though the Stavanger strings are a bit thin and a good (if not characteristically spectacular) BIS recording.• Penguin Guide, January 2009

CD

10.07.2001

747313507825

Audiophile Audition: 'Best of the Year Disc' (2012)