Romance in G major Op.26

Norwegian music round the turn of the 20th century was so comprehenisvely dominated by Edvard Grieg that even now, outside Scandinavia, there is little room in concert programmes for other composers of the same nationality working at the same time. No doubt some of them deserve their neglect but surely not Johan Svendsen who, Grieg observed, “has precisely all that which I don’t have”. What Svendsen had was the quality that made him, unlike Grieg, a born symphonist, as his two works of that kind demonstrate. He is also the composer of – among other things, including violin and cello concertos – four tuneful Norwegian Rhapsodes and the present modestly orchestrated but irresistible Romance in G major Op.26 of 1881.

After a short, chromatically sinking orchestral introduction, the solo violin makes its first entry with the nostalgic main theme in G major carried mainly in the expressive upper register of the instrument. Rarely silent from this point on, it also has the responsibility of introducing a contrastingly urgent episode in G minor with worried offbeat accompaniment on the upper strings and a pizzicato bass line. By way of a slow, strongly emphatic transition on the G-string, recalling the orchestral introduction, the violin makes its way back to the main theme and, following the climax of the work, a lingering, gradually fading ending.

Gerald Larner © 2017