2 weeks ago
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Hygge lives on at the Minnesota Orchestra.
Visitors stepping into Orchestra Hall in Minneapolis on a recent, frigid Saturday were greeted with a roaring fireplace and Scandi furniture strewed with blankets. Snacks were on sale from Ingebretsen’s, a local purveyor of Nordic goods, and pastries from the nearby Krown Bakery. In the lobby, the singer Taylor Ann Grand gave a brief introduction to Danish folk tunes; upstairs, the Icelandic Hekla Club explained different varieties of wool, and the Danish American Center handed out traditional paper crafts to take home.
The occasion was the Minnesota Orchestra’s first Nordic Soundscapes Festival. The inspiration was Thomas Sondergard, the Danish conductor in his second season as music director.
Scandinavian themes are nothing new in Minneapolis, which was partly built on immigration from that region, or at this ensemble. Its audiences were known to fly Finnish flags in honor of Osmo Vänskä, who raised the orchestra to rare heights of excellence in a turbulent 19-year tenure as music director that ended in 2022. But Sondergard, 55, is slowly making his influence felt on everything from what the orchestra plays to the interior design of its spaces.
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The festival’s repertoire was notably broad: Loosely centered on the Danish composer Carl Nielsen, it made room for overlooked composers as well as important contemporary scores. The first orchestral program of the two weeks started with an energetic overture by Elfrida Andrée, a pioneering Swedish composer, organist and conductor; took in new works like Bent Sorensen’s atmospheric “Evening Land” and Outi Tarkiainen’s “Midnight Sun Variations,” a remarkable reflection on light; and ended with a strikingly comforting rendition of Sibelius’s “Finlandia.”
It wasn’t the kind of concert you would have associated with Sondergard’s predecessor, whose final season included a festival focused on Sibelius alone. But one thing was certain: Under its new leader the Minnesota Orchestra still has the pride and quality that Vänskä helped instill, playing with a conviction and an intensity that could put many a more heralded ensemble to shame.
