Musikfynd i P.B:s lönnlåda

One of the three CDs in the 14th volume of the Collector’s Classics series includes everything that has been preserved of Peterson-Berger’s voice, piano playing and conducting, along with recordings of his songs with two of his favorite singers, such as Mathilda Jungstedt, on unique test records played back from the EMI central archive in Hayes at the time it was still available.

On the other two CD’s of this volume, the original version of the 1st and 2nd acts of the opera Arnljot is represented in live recordings from 1942. That is, while the composer was still alive, and no one thought of clearing away all of the personal touches of memories of nature in the score in order to make it more practical to perform. This is something the conductor Stig Rybrant did on the P.-B. Foundation’s mandate a few years later, and whose “scorched earth” (Carl-Gunnar Åhlén’s name for the result) so far has been the only version that has been available.

After just over thirty years, all five of the archived steel tape reels with the live recordings were found, and the 2nd act was broadcast on radio on December 9, 1974. Prior to the radio broadcast, actress Maria Schildknecht was asked to tell the listeners her memories of the composer and to read sections from Arnljot, which entire text she had performed publicly in 1907 together with the composer at the piano in Stockholm, Östersund and Sundsvall. Here, these texts begin each act. Her reading tour turned out to be of great importance, both for her in her career, but also for Arnljot‘s transformation from a dramatic text to a full-scale opera.

In his presentation of Arnljot in the booklet, Åhlén tells the story of how the idea of Jämtland as an independent kingdom was added during Peterson-Berger’s month-long hiking in the summer of 1905. At that time, it was an area that was characterised by the Norwegian and Swedish mobilisation during the union crisis, a conflict that hit him close so close to home that he had to react. He did this by placing his story in the Viking Age, and as the main character in the drama that took shape during the autumn, he chose a historical figure: Arnljot from Gelline.

It was this little script that ended up in the hands of Schildknecht, who, through her readings, gave rise to the idea of an opera. But the Peterson-Berger would only find the time to actually compose it after he left on leave from his position as music critic in the Dagens Nyheter newspaper. The fate of the opera during the following century at the Royal Stockholm Opera is discussed in the booklet, together with essays about Peterson-Berger as both pianist and conductor.

© Carl-Gunnar Åhlén 2019

Selection, audio transfer & processing, and texts: Carl-Gunnar Åhlén
Mastering: John Hyttnäs
Graphic design: Eva Åhlén och Carl-Gunnar Åhlén
Translation to English: Erik Hamrefors