Edvard Grieg composed his "Ave Maris Stella" ("Hail Star of the Sea"), for mixed choir, in 1898. Its lyrics, in Latin and English, are below the embedded video. Ave, maris stella, Dei mater alma, atque semper virgo, felix cœli porta. Sumens illud "Ave" Gabrielis ore, funda nos in pace, mutans Evæ nomen Solve vincla reis, [...]
Oh, the many moods and stories Norwegian composer Edvard Grieg conjures in my mind, my heart. There’s the transcendent “Morning Mood” from his Peer Gynt Suite, the haunting yet hopeful “Last Spring.” I’ve sat in my car and wept to the wintry longing in his “Nocturne.” There’s the “March of the Dwarves” that evokes a [...]
I return to the Grieg concerto annually; it seems to be a late summer thing. The music taps into a deep spring that flows eternal, and my feelings, in the twenty years I’ve listened to this, haven’t changed. Which makes me so deeply grateful that art like this exists, to remind me of all that [...]