letters from Scandinavia

"Vivid storytelling...It is meticulously researched and brilliantly executed."

Hannah French – BBC Radio 3 Record Review

Mezzo- soprano Joanna Harries and pianist Sholto Kynoch weave together a treasure trove of Scandinavian song with nineteenth century travel writing.

A love letter to all things Nordic, Letters from Scandinavia is both song recital and historical audio travel guide, a weaving together of music and text that follows in the footsteps of intrepid nineteenth century women journeying in the ‘wild north’. The songs are drawn from the golden age of Scandinavian song, interspersed with readings which are underscored and brought to life by specially-commissioned new music from composer Peter Facer.

Release Date: 5 September 2025

Buy here

“This is an unusual and enchanting thing – not just an album but an embracing narrative experience…”

Andrew Mellor – Gramophone

listen

Laura Netzel
Säg mig, du lilla fogel

Agathe Backer Grøndahl
Skjærer (Op.52, No.6)

Edvard Grieg
Til Norge (Op.58, No.2)

"…Harries knows how to project with an intimate expressiveness, while Kynoch emphasizes the richness of harmonic colour.”

Marçal Borotau  – Sonograma

Wilhelm Stenhammar
Jungfru Blond och jungfru Brunett (Op.26, No.4)

Sibelius
Norden (Op.90, No.1)

Agathe Backer Grøndahl
Till mit Hjertes Dronning (Op.1, No.3)

Edvard Grieg
Foraarsregn (Op.49, No.6)

music

  1. Edvard Grieg Til Norge (Op. 58 No. 2 – Norge)
  2. Peter Facer Roskilde
  3. Wilhelm Stenhammar Jutta kommer til Folkungarna (Op.37, No.1 – 4 Dikter Av Verner von Heidenstam )
  4. Peter Facer The Skagerrak
  5. Agathe Backer Grøndahl  Sildig (Op.17, No.7 – Sange ved Havet)
  6. Peter Facer  Gudbrandsdalen
  7. Edvard Grieg Møte (Op.67, No.4 – Haugtussa)
  8. Peter Facer Sognefjellet
  9. Agathe Backer Grøndahl Till mit Hjertes Dronning (Op.1, No.3 – 3 Sange)
  10. Peter Facer  Hallingdal
  11. Agathe Backer Grøndahl  Skjærer (Op.52, No.6 – Mor Synger)
  12. Peter Facer  Telemark Forests
  13. Edvard Grieg Foraarsregn (Op.49, No.6 – 6 Digte af Holger Drachmann) 
  14. Peter Facer  Fredrikstad
  15. Edvard Grieg På Norges nøgne fjelde (Op.59, No.2 – Elegiske dikt)
  16. Peter Facer  Strömstad
  17. Wilhelm Stenhammar Jungfru Blond och jungfru Brunett (Op.26, No.4 – Visor och Stämningar) 
  18. Peter Facer  Göta Canal
  19. Laura Netzel Säg mig, du lilla fogel
  20. Peter Facer Norrland
  21. Helena Munktell  Fjerran på enslig stig
  22. Peter Facer Stockholm
  23. Wilhelm Stenhammar Vid fönstret (Op.20, No.2 – 5 sånger till dikter af Bo Bergman)
  24. Peter Facer Åland Islands
  25. Jean Sibelius Norden (Op.90, No.1 – 6 sånger)
  26. Peter Facer Finnish Forests
  27. Jean Sibelius Kaiutar (Op.72, No.4: – 6 sånger)
  28. Peter Facer Farewell
  29. Edvard Grieg Ved Gjætle-Bekken (Op.67, No.8 – Haugtussa)
Read CD booklet (including texts & translations)

about

"The only use of a gentleman in travelling is to look after the luggage, and we take care to have no luggage."

Unprotected Females in Norway – Helen Emily Lowe (1857)

Letters from Scandinavia is, I hope, an adventure.

It certainly has been for me in creating it. It began with a chance stumbling on Mary Wollstonecraft’s Letters written during a short residency in Sweden, Denmark & Norway, written on the cusp of the nineteenth century, at a time when most of the rest of Europe was almost entirely ignorant of the “wild north”. I soon discovered a treasure trove of historic travel writing about Scandinavia, which I duly devoured – from Selina Bunbury’s Life in Sweden to Helen Emily Lowe’s wonderfully titled Unprotected Females in Norway.

These writers’ awestruck impressions of Nordic landscapes and culture – and their excitement at discovering for themselves something so special that they simply must write home about it – reminded me of my own first encounters with Swedish and Norwegian song. Scandinavian song has to be the most unjustly underperformed of the song repertoire, but once discovered, it is difficult not to evangelise to everyone you meet about what they might be missing out on. It set me off on my own journey; I devoured all the travel writing I could find, poured over historic maps, and raided the archives of Nordic composers, both well-known and little performed. 

It has grown into something between a song recital and a historical audio travel guide, I suppose. A weaving together of music and text as it follows in the footsteps of women journeying to nineteenth-century Nordic countries for the first time. The music is drawn from a rich vein of song by composers including Agathe Backer Grøndahl, Edvard Grieg, Helena Munktell, Laura Netzel, Jean Sibelius and Wilhelm Stenhammar, and interwoven between the songs are new texts inspired by colourful and evocative nineteenth century travel writing. I’ve had the huge pleasure of working with composer Peter Facer to bring these texts to life with new music to underscore the spoken word.

This period is truly a golden age of Scandinavian song, with a repertoire full of (often undeservedly neglected) gems that are hugely rewarding to perform for both singer and pianist. I’m grateful that my fellow traveller is pianist Sholto Kynoch, who first introduced me to Backer Grøndahl’s works a few years ago, and who plays this repertoire so beautifully.

Letters from Scandinavia is above all a love letter to all things Nordic. I very much hope you enjoy it. (Best served with a cinnamon bun…

Joanna Harries – London, 2024

the journey

writing the "Letters"

When underscoring the spoken word interludes, my aim was to create a piano accompaniment that would support rather than overwhelm. Thus, it has taken the form of either short musical ‘punctuation marks’ or a more constant soundscape of rhythmic ostinati with evolving harmonies; using too many distinctive melodies might distract the ear away from the spoken text! Instead of melody, I have explored the idea of leitmotiv and created three small motivic fragments (one each for Norway, Sweden and Finland, and themselves derived from the songs) and teased them out in different directions in each interlude.

One challenge was to maintain my own compositional voice whilst writing in a style which would complement the songs. I wanted the songs and interludes to sound like they belonged together, without attempting to pastiche the styles of Grieg, Sibelius et al. So, I have kept nineteenth-century musical idioms as the basis, but with modernist dustings of gnarl, soup and rhythmic mischief. Another of the great thrills of this project was coming up with musical segues from my interludes into the songs which are (hopefully) so seamless that in some instances it will be very difficult to discern where my music ends, and the next song begins.

Peter Facer, composer – London, 2024

the team

Joanna Harries - mezzo-soprano

Praised for her “stylish” singing (Opera Magazine) and the “emotional force” (The Times) of her performances, mezzo-soprano Joanna Harries recently finished at the National Opera Studio and made her debut with Opera Rara at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, the London Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican, and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra at Cadogan Hall.

www.joannaharries.com

Sholto Kynoch - piano

Sholto Kynoch is a sought-after pianist who specialises in song and chamber music. He is the founder and Artistic Director of the Oxford International Song Festival (formerly Oxford Lieder), which won a prestigious Royal Philharmonic Society Award in 2015, cited for its ‘breadth, depth and audacity’ of programming. In July 2018, Sholto was elected a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music in the RAM Honours. Working with many of today’s leading singers, recent recitals have taken him to Wigmore Hall, Heidelberger Frühling, Beethovenfest Bonn, the Zeist International Lied Festival in the Netherlands, the LIFE Victoria festival and Palau de la Música in Barcelona, the Fundación Juan March in Madrid, the Opéra de Lille, Opernhaus Zürich, Maison Symphonique de Montréal, Queensland Art Song Festival in Australia, and many other leading venues and festivals nationally and internationally.

His extensive discography includes the first complete edition of the songs of Hugo Wolf, recorded live at the Oxford International Song Festival, the final volume of which was released in January 2023. He has also recorded the complete songs of John Ireland and Havergal Brian, as well as recital discs of Schubert and Schumann songs. Sholto is also the pianist of the Phoenix Piano Trio, with violinist Jonathan Stone and cellist Christian Elliott.

thanks & support

With thanks to the supporters who have helped to bring this project to life:

Arts Council DYCP Award
Nicholas Boas Trust
International Opera Awards

Follow on social media

Instagram Facebook-f Youtube