Holmboe: Chamber Symphonies

Featuring

John Storgårds
Lapland Chamber Orchestra
Vagn Holmboe

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Composition History

Chamber Symphony No. 1 was premiered in Copenhagen in 1951 by conductor Lavard Friisholm, who had founded the Collegium Musicum chamber orchestra to play neglected Baroque music, and Holmboe even subtitled the work 'Collegium Musicum no. 1'.

Composition History

Chamber Symphony No. 3, subtitled 'Frise' ('Frieze'), was written in parallel with sculptor Arne L. Hansen's ceramic frieze for Aalborghus Upper Secondary School, with movement names suggested by Holmboe.

Composer Biography

Vagn Holmboe, the composer, bought a country property with his prize money from winning the Royal Danish Orchestra's composition competition in 1939, where he lived until his death in 1996 and planted 3000 trees.

Composer's Artistic Vision

Holmboe's compositional technique of 'metamorphosis' involves a theme changing into something entirely different from its origin, which he saw as a musical counterpart to the continuous change in nature.

Performer Biography

John Storgårds, the conductor on this album, has a dual career as a conductor and violin virtuoso and is known as a pioneer in contemporary music.

Performer Biography

The Lapland Chamber Orchestra, founded in 1972 and based in Rovaniemi, is the most northerly professional orchestra in the European Union.

Composition History

Holmboe created a wordless a cappella choral version of his Chamber Symphony No. 3, titled 'Frieze', which was performed alongside the orchestral version at the school's inauguration.