Awake, O North Wind

By Helene Stureborg

Item Number: NX.FRCD-088

Footprint is pleased to release a new recording from one of the most talented youth ensembles in Sweden, the Chamber Choir of the Stockholm Music Gymnasium. The school's chamber choir is made up of 40 of the school's hundreds of vocal specialists, and is led by Helene Stureborg, a sometime pupil of Eric Ericsson and Gustav Sjokvist. Awake O North Wind is a heartfelt and atmospheric journey through some of the finest unaccompanied Swedish and Norwegian choral works of the last two centuries, with an emphasis on music by living composers. The miniature masterpieces that are Sven-David Sansdstrom's Four Songs of Love form the backbone of the programme and are spread among works by Wilhelm Stenhammar, Knut Nystedt, Trond Kverno, Karin Rehnqvist and others, with spine-tingling arrangements of Swedish and Norwegian folk songs included too. The Stockholm Music Gymnasium Chamber Choir has recorded for film soundtracks and appeared with artists including Andrea Bocelli. The ensemble's full, rounded sound and intense clarity at high registers is revealed fully on its new recording, whose programme of repertoire members of the ensemble shaped under Stureborg's guidance. 'These young musicians have so much to give', says the conductor. 'They take responsibility, they are so focussed and they want so much from the music. I love to work with them!' Awake O North Wind is a snapshot of both human awakening and burgeoning talent, with all the excitement inherent in both.