Henning Kraggerud (Violin, Viola, Conductor, Composer)

Born: June 23, 1973 - Oslo, Norway

The Norwegian violinist, violist, conductor and composer Henning Kraggerud, studied with Camilla Wicks, Emanuel Hurwitz and Stephan Barratt-Due, among others. He is a recipient of Norway's prestigious Grieg Prize and in 2007 was awarded the Sibelius Prize for his interpretations and recording of Sibelius’ music around the world.Henning Kraggerud's extraordinary reach as an artist is a result of his versatility and passion for music, as well as the genuine quality to his playing and the beauty of his performances. His teaching and educational writings provide fascinating insights into his multi-faceted approach to music-making, while his composing, arranging and improvising – frequently bringing his own works into the concert hall – recall the spirit of the old masters such as Fritz Kreisler and Eugène Ysaÿe.

An artist of exquisite musicianship, Henning Kraggerud is invited time and again to join many of the world’s most important orchestras, including the London Philharmonic Orchestra, Philharmonia Orchestra, Hallé Orchestra, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra, Danish National Symphony Orchestra, Tonkünstler-Orchester, Baltimore Symphony, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Hong Kong Philharmonic, Melbourne Symphony, Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra and Macao Orchestra. He frequently leads ensembles such as Britten Sinfonia, Swedish Chamber Orchestra and Australian Chamber Orchestra. He performs regularly with eminent conductors such as Denève, Jukka-Pekka Saraste, Thomas Dausgaard, Osmo Vänskä, Paul McCreesh and Nicholas McGegan, to name a few.

In Summer 2010 Henning Kraggerud gave a critically-acclaimed performance at the BBC Proms with the Danish National Symphony Orchestra under Thomas Dausgaard, and a highly successful season followed including concerts with the Hallé Orchestra, the Bergen Festival, the West Australian Symphony and Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and a recital at New York’s Lincoln Center. After a triumphant debut with the London Philharmonic Orchestra under Osmo Vänska in 2010, Henning has been invited to re-join the conductor at the New World Symphony in the 2011-2012 season. A favourite with USA audiences, he has worked previously with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra under Peter Oundjian and the Seattle Symphony Orchestra under Vassily Sinaisky among others, and in 2012-2013 season returned to the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra as well as performing as soloist and conductor with both the Pacific Symphony and Vancouver Symphony Orchestra.

Henning Kraggerud's 2012 performance at the Hollywood Bowl with the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra was hailed by one critic as “the high point of the night. It was Mozart as…Mozart himself would have wanted it played”, while his debut with the Philharmonia Orchestra earned him five-star praise in the UK press. His BBC Proms debut with the Danish National Symphony Orchestra resulted in a re-invitation to the 2015 BBC Proms, and a performance with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, broadcast live from Carnegie Hall in 2009, was extolled by one critic as “a breath of fresh air…who knew that Beethoven could be this much fun?”

The play/directing element of Henning Kraggerud's career is fast developing as he proves his exceptional talent in this role. In 2009, he stepped in at late notice to play/direct the Britten Sinfonia at the City of London Festival; such was his success that the ensemble invited him as guest director on two major touring projects in 2011. His performance with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra at Carnegie Hall in the 2009-2010 season was hailed by the New York Times for his “sweet, polished sound” and the “melting beauty” of his playing. He has performed as play/director with the Zürcher Kammerorchester, and in the 2011-2012 season joined the Kammerorchester Basel on a tour to include the Rheingau Festival. Extending his work with chamber orchestras further, he returned in 2012-2013 season to the Geneva Chamber Orchestra where he had been invited to curate a complete programme for violin and viola along with Ilya Gringolts and conductor David Greilsammer.

In the 2018-2019 season, Kraggerud is Artist in Residence with the Kristiansand Symphony Orchestra in Norway and the Poznan Philharmonic Orchestra in Poland. Highlights of the 2019-2020 season include debuts with the Deutsche Kammerakademie Neuss am Rhein, Orchestra della Toscana, Royal Danish Opera orchestra and Kuopio Symphony. He also returns to Helsingborg Symphony and Vancouver Symphony orchestras and appears with Camerata Salzburg and Janine Jansen at the Salzburg Mozartwoche and on tour in Germany.

With a strong Scandinavian profile, Henning Kraggerud continues to work extensively in his home region, including recent concerts with the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra and the Lahti Symphony Orchestra with Jukka-Pekka Saraste. He has maintained frequent collaborations with the Helsinki Philharmonic and Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra and the Norwegian Chamber orchestras, as well as strong links with many of the Norwegian festivals. The 2011-2012 season saw a return to the Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra. In Summer 2011, he began his role as co-Artistic Director of the Risør Festival of Chamber Music, succeeding Leif Ove Andsnes, and in August 2011 was appointed Artistic Director of Arctic Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra.

With his strong commitment to chamber music, Henning Kraggerud performs both on violin and viola at the major international festivals; recent collaborations have included a ‘Szymanowski Focus’ at London’s Wigmore Hall and New York’s Zankel Hall curated by Piotr Anderszewski, and performances at the Verbier Festival with Joshua Bell, Leonidas Kavakos and Martha Argerich. In 2011-2012 seasion, he joined musical colleagues at the Hong Kong International Chamber Music Festival, Poland’s prestigious International Festival Wratislavia Cantans, the Holland Summer Festand the Cheltenham Festival. He has also performed chamber music at BBC Proms, Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Hollywood Bowl, Carnegie Hall, King’s Place, Bruges Concertgebouw, Berlin Konzerthaus and Budapest’s kamara.hu festival, appearing alongside artists including Imogen Cooper, Adrian Brendel, Steven Isserlis, Lawrence Power, Leif Ove Andsnes, Håvard Gimse, Kathryn Stott, Natalie Clein, Christian Ihle Hadland, Christian Poltéra and Jeremy Menuhin. As a solo recitalist, the 2011-2012 season saw his recital debut in Tokyo, where he performed the complete unaccompanied Violin Sonatas by Ysaye; he has recorded all these works for Simax for which he received the prestigious Spellemann CD award. He also brought this programme to the Yerevan International Music Festival in 2011-2012 season, and with frequent collaborator Christian Ihle Hadland, gave recitals in Dublin and Manchester. In the 2018-2019 season, he toured the UK with Adrian Brendel and Imogen Cooper, including a return to Wigmore Hall. In 2019-2020 season, he re-joined with jazz pianist Bugge Wesseltoft for a performance at Jazz at Berlin Philharmonic.

Adding to his multi-faceted career, Henning Kraggerud is an innovative improviser, performing many of his own cadenzas and arrangements in concert. Following in the footsteps of Fritz Kreisler and Eugène Ysaÿe, he is also a composer. With more than 200 works to his name, recent examples include Preghiera, and performed by the Brodsky Quartet, and The Last Leaf premiered in 2014 by Britten Sinfonia, as well as cadenzas for two of Haydn’s cello concertos commissioned by Clemens Hagen in 2015 and Victimae Paschali for choir and orchestra commissioned by the Trondheim Chamber Music Festival. His works are performed by many prominent musicians and orchestras around the globe. In 2014, his reputation as a composer was sealed by the premiere of his largest-scale work to date Equinox: 24 Postludes in All Keys for Violin and String Orchestra. Commissioned, premiered and recorded by the Arctic Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra with Henning as soloist, the work was composed as a musical counterpart to a story specially written by world-famous author Jostein Gaarder Gaarder (author of Sophie’s World), and has been hailed as “endlessly resourceful and surprising” (BBC Music Magazine, five stars) and has been hailed as “a fascinating composition to return to over and over again” (MusicWeb International). In 2017, he composed a violin/piano version of Equinox, which was premiered in Norway in 2018 with pianist Clare Hammond and Jostein Gaarder narrating. In 2017, the Ostrobothnian Chamber Orchestra commissioned and premiered Topelius Variations for string orchestra, which went on to be performed again by Henning on a national tour with the Australian Chamber Orchestra, and with the Portuguese National Symphony Orchestra.

In June 2010, Henning Kraggerud premiered the Munch Suite for Solo Violin, a new and unique concert project consisting of new pieces by fifteen composers from around the world. Taking place at the Haugar Vestfold Kunstmuseum in Tønsberg, Norway, as part of the Vestfold International Festival, these pieces were inspired by the works of Edvard Munch and were performed in dialogue with the paintings themselves at an exclusive arts experience. The Suite was released by Simax Classics in a deluxe edition including 15 reproductions by Munch.

With his ever-present spirit of discovery, Henning gave the 21st century premiere of the Johan Halvorsen Violin Concerto with the Norwegian Chamber Orchestra at the 2016 Risør Chamber Music Festival. Originally premiered in 1909, the concerto was subsequently considered lost until its re-discovery over 100 years later. Henning went on to play the work with the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra and Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra, and in 2017 released a recording on the Naxos label with the Malmö Symphony Orchestra and Bjarte Engeset, leading BBC Radio 3’s Record Review to comment, “It’s difficult to imagine more ardent advocates for this sleeping beauty of a piece”. In the current season, Henning gives the first ever performances of the work in Poland with the Poznan Philharmonic and in Finland with the Kymi Sinfonietta.

Henning Kraggerud's eclectic discography includes many recordings on the Naxos label. His Naxos recording of W.A. Mozart's Concertos Nos. 3, 4 and 5 with the Norwegian Chamber orchestra included Henning’s own cadenzas, and was awarded an ECHO Klassik Award as well as chosen as Classic FM’s Album of the Week, NDR Kultur’s CD of the Week, Editor’s Choice in Classical Music Magazine, Recommended in The Strad, and featured on BBC Radio 3’s Record Review. His Naxos recordings, includde also Edvard Grieg’s three sonatas arranged as concerti and the violin concerto of Johan Halvorsen, considered lost for over 100 years and re-discovered in 2016.

In 2017, Henning Kraggerud released a disc on the Simax label in collaboration with the Arctic Philharmonic Orchestra and world-famous author Erik Fosnes Hansen. Entitled Between the Seasons, the disc features Antonio Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons interspersed with Henning’s own compositions. It has been described as “one of the best recordings - maybe the best - of the Vivaldi cycle” (MusicWeb International). Also for Simax, he has recorded the complete solo sonatas of Eugène Ysaÿe, on a disc which won the prestigious Spellemann CD award. With many highly-acclaimed discs to his name, his recent releases are of Schubert’s Arpeggione Sonata for viola and piano recorded with fellow Norwegian Håvard Gimse (Naim) and of W.A. Mozart's Divertimento in E flat major with Lars Anders Tomter and Christoph Richter (Naxos). His most recent DVD consists of 19 works by Kreisler for violin and orchestra, together with stories of the composer’s life. On the ACT label, he released a disc entitled Last Spring which explored improvisations on Norwegian folk music with jazz pianist Bugge Wesseltoft. In addition to his distinguished discography, he was involved in making a major television & cinema documentary about the Norwegian violin virtuoso and composer, Ole Bull (1810-1880), released in November 2006 and more recently as an English language version. He received the Ole Bull Prize in 2007.

In 2015, Henning Kraggerud became International Chair in Violin at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, and in 2017 received a Fellowship. Passionate about musical education, he is a Professor at the Barratt Due Institute of Music in Oslo, and in 2018 was a jury member at the Menuhin Competition in Geneva, where he also performed the opening concert with Orchestre de la Suisse Romande under Marin Alsop. In 2019-2020 season, he is a jury member at the Leeds Piano Competition.

Henning Kraggerud plays on a 1744 Guarneri del Gesù, provided by Dextra Musica AS. This company is founded by Sparebankstiftelsen DNB.

Sources:
Liner notes to the album "Variations - J.S. Bach: Goldberg Variations; H. Kraggerud: Topelius Variations" (Simax, 2018)
Henning Kraggerud Page on Facebook & Website
IMG Artists website (version of March 7, 2012 from Internert Archive)
Wikipedia Website
Photos 01-03, 05, 08, 10-11, 15-17, 19, 22: Robert Romik; Photos 04, 06-07,12, 14, 23: Kaupo Kikkas; Photo 09: Alexandra Watson
Contributed by Aryeh Oron (July 2019)

Henning Kraggerud: Short Biography | Ensembles: Arctic Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra
Bach Discography: Recordings of Instrumental Works

Links to other Sites

Henning Kraggerud Page on Facebook
Henning Kraggerud - Violinst and Composer (Official Website)
Henning Kraggerud (Wikipedia)
Henning Kraggerud (Arktisk Filharmoni)
Henning Kraggerud (Royal Northern College of Music)
Henning Kraggerud Violinist (ACMF)
Henning Kraggerud | Biography & History (AMG)