Weingarten Season: Ragnhild Hemsing & Trondheim Soloists

Bodensee Festival 2026 Edvard Grieg's Peer Gynt Suites are among the most famous orchestral works of romantic music. However, the arrangement of the play of the same name by Henrik Ibsen for the Norwegian folk instrument, the Hardanger fiddle, may be less known. The Norwegian violinist Ragnhild Hemsing has engaged with one of the most famous and legendary figures of Norway: Peer Gynt. For this, she had selected sections of the Peer Gynt incidental music arranged for her solo instruments, the Hardanger fiddle and violin, along with string orchestra. It is particularly noticeable that Norwegian folk music and the traditional Hardanger fiddle influenced Grieg in his composition, especially in the piece titled "Morning Mood": The first notes of this work correspond exactly to the sympathetic strings of the Hardanger fiddle: A F# E D E F#. Ragnhild Hemsing, who won the OPUS KLASSIK in 2021, also integrates another aspect of folk music into the suites: improvisation. "For me, having my roots in folk music, this is completely natural. It was not written down. In my improvisation, I draw on the freedom I feel in the music and the tradition I want to bring into the classical genre." Ragnhild Hemsing is accompanied by the internationally renowned Trondheim Soloists. "The Peer Gynt Suites now resonate in a new guise and with a new sound. A shared, exciting, and rewarding exploratory process," as the musician emphasizes. This is more authentic than the original.