Magnus Granberg

Saturday 29 November 2025
Skogen's 20th Anniversary at Music We'd Like to Hear in London!
Music We'd Like to Hear GB
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Seth Starre Lacotte

Celebrating their 20 year anniversary, Skogen perform the world premiere of Magnus Granberg’s Trouble, Had it All My Days (scored for 13 musicians). This new work takes an aria (Seufzer, Tränen, ängstlich sehnen) from Bachs’s cantata BWV 21, Ich hatte viel Bekümmerniß as its point of departure but borrows its title from the lyrics of a song by American blues singer and guitarist Mississippi John Hurt. Skogen is a Swedish ensemble working at an intersection between contemporary chamber music and improvisation. The music, which originates from the interplay between composition and improvisation and between individual and collective processes, is a poetical practice which in subtle and seemingly paradoxical ways unifies order with chaos, unity with diversity and the past with the present. The ensemble has released eight CDs on the renowned British record label Another Timbre and has performed at festivals such as Ultima (NO), Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival (UK), Splitter Music Festival (DE) and Ulrichsberger Kaleidophon (AT).

Skogen:

Anna Lindal, violin

Eva Lindal, violin

Angharad Davies, violin

Leo Svensson Sander, cello

Heather Roche, clarinet

Finn Loxbo, guitar

Stina Hellberg Agback, harp

Magnus Granberg, prepared piano

Simon Allen, vibraphone and percussion Erik Carlsson, percussion

Henrik Olsson, amplified objects

Petter Wästberg, contact microphone, mixer, loudspeaker

Toshimaru Nakamura, no-input mixing board.

With support from STIM Forward Fund, Swedish Arts Council, Helge Ax:son Johnsons Stiftelse and Längmanska Kulturfonden.

Skogen is a Swedish ensemble working at an intersection between contemporary chamber music and improvisation. The ensemble was founded in 2005 and has since its inception collaborated regularly with international artists such as Angharad Davies, Ko Ishikawa, Toshimaru Nakamura, Rhodri Davies and Simon Allen. The ensemble has mainly been performing music by its founder Magnus Granberg, but has also performed and recorded music by composers such as Anders Dahl and Morgan Evans-Weiler.

The music, which originates from the interplay between composition and improvisation and between individual and collective processes, is a poetical practice which in subtle and seemingly paradoxical ways unifies order with chaos, unity with diversity and the past with the present.

The ensemble has released seven CDs on the renowned British record label Another Timbre and has performed at festivals such as Ultima (NO), Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival (UK), Himera (FI), Sound of Stockholm (SE), Splitter Music Festival (DE) and Ulrichsberger Kaleidophon (AT).

Personnel (various settings and sizes):

Eva Lindal (violin, Anna Lindal (violin) Angharad Davies (violin) Leo Svensson Sander (cello), Stina Hellberg Agback (harp), Rhodri Davies (harp), Magnus Granberg (prepared piano), John Eriksson (vibraphone and percussion) Simon Allen (vibraphone and percussion) Erik Carlsson (percussion), Henrik Olsson (percussion and electronics), Petter Wästberg (electronics and objects), Ko Ishikawa (sho), Toshimaru Nakamura (no-input mixing board) and Heather Roche (clarinet).