Gil Shaham

What an incredible positive force of nature. A seasoned artist, but yet so youthful in his music making and always so connected with his fellow musicians.

A week and night to remember, for sure.

Leif Ove Andsnes

One performer, one perspective.

I wanted to see if one could tell a story of the rather intense and intimate rehearsal process, from only one perspective.

The great Leif Ove Andsnes rehearsing works by Debussy and Franck with the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra in May 2024.

Documenting this part of the artistic process is in many ways as interesting as photographing the end result, the performance where everyone with a ticket can attend.

La Bohème, a Scandinavian edition.

Maestro Massimo Zanetti

Concept, stage design and stage direction
José Cura
Current direction
Victoria Bomann-Larsen

MIMÌ
Elsa Dreisig
AUGUST STRINDBERG/RUDOLFO
Stefan Pop
EDVARD MUNCH/MARCELLO
John Chest
TULLA LARSEN/MUSETTA
Lina Johnson
EDVARD GRIEG/SCHAUNARD
Magnus Berg
SØREN KIERKEGAARD/COLLINE
Petri Lindroos
BENOIT & ALCINDORO
Ola Marius Ryan
JULBOCKEN/PARPIGNOL
Arnstein Morken
TRONDHEIM SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA AND CHOIR(S)

Up-close with Klaus Mäkelä, the Oslo Philharmonic and The Nordic Conductor´s Forum.

Péter Eötvös in Stavanger

I spent a day in Stavanger observing and documenting noted composer and conductor Péter Eötvös working with a selected number of participants from the Norwegian conductor’s program (Dirigentløftet/Talent Norge/Sparebankstiftelsen).

Maestro Eötvös was this season’s Composer in Residence of the Stavanger Symphony Orchestra, also conducting his own works.

Here are a few impressions from their last workshop day.

Two days at the Opera House in Oslo.

I was recently back in Oslo making portraits of orchestral and choral conductors that take part in the Norwegian conductor’s program (Dirigentløftet/Talent Norge/Sparebankstiftelsen).

The sessions were held inside the beautiful Opera House. As a lover of architecture, it was a treat to have the textures and shapes of this iconic building as my backdrop.

Here are a few samples from these sessions.

Three days in Oslo photographing 10 conductors.

The talent program for young conductors from, or based in, Norway (Dirigentløftet/Talent Norge/Sparebankstiftelsen) recently hired me to make new portraits of their current roster of talents.

The sessions were held at Sentralen in Oslo. Even with such a cool location, it was still a real challenge to make one location work with no less than 10 distinctive individuals.

Here are a few samples from our chamber music like sessions.

Berlin meets Røros, through music.

I have a passion for music, obviously, and for photography. When those two worlds meet, then I’m really in my “happy place”. That happened recently in Røros (Norway), a wonderful place in so many ways. It’s a town of great beauty and character, and consequently included on the UNESCO World Heritage List. Combine that with just as welcoming and dedicated locals, world class musicians from the Berliner Philharmoniker mentoring young talents from Norway and it would be hard imagining a better day out in the field.

The day started at 4AM, catching an early train to Røros and ended back home again at around 11PM. The client, “Vinterfestspill i Bergstaden” (a festival being held in March each year), wanted promotional images of Røros, the people involved locally and the visiting artists. A real challenge fitting all those things into a single day of shooting, but seeing the different images now appearing on the festival’s website and social media platforms, I think that the collaboration went quite well. Take a look at https://vinterfestspill.no and judge for yourself.

I’m delighted to be going back to Røros for the festival in late March.

Portrait session

I had the pleasure of doing a studio portrait and “lifestyle” session with chief conductor of the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra & Opera, Han-Na Chang, recently.

This session continued our collaboration from last year, when we made a series I called “Han-Na Chang in Trondheim”.

All these images are now the visual backbone of her website and press material:

https://www.hannachangmusic.com

I have now switched to an all Leica-setup, and I am delighted with how this system works for me both on location and in the studio. Like everything, it has its quirks but the gorgeous image fidelity makes it all worth while. I enjoy that the images coming straight out of the camera is so close to where I want them to be, the editing is more about tweaking than completely rebuilding the image file.

Our planned “conductor on stage and in action”-session sadly had to be postponed due to the Covid-situation, but will hopefully happen later this spring.

Gear used:

Leica SL2s

Leica Vario-Elmarit-SL 24-90mm/f2.8-4 ASPH.

Leica Vario-Elmarit-SL 90-280mm/f2.8-4 ASPH.

3x Profoto B10 studio strobes with various light modifiers.

Han-Na Chang in Trondheim

I had the pleasure of photographing the chief conductor of the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra & Opera on the streets of (exactly) Trondheim this fall. In the spring of 2022 I will capture her in action with the orchestra as well as doing a studio portrait session.

https://www.hannachangmusic.com

In the spotlight

Principal double bass of the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra & Opera Aaron Olguin in the spotlight.

James Gaffigan

Publicity images of principal guest conductor of the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra & Opera, James Gaffigan.

A group portrait with a grand backdrop

A quick group portrait of the Trondheim Vocal Ensemble, after the performance of the Christmas Oratorio. When you have a backdrop as grand as this one, I wanted to incorporate as much of the surroundings as possible. That led to this somewhat unusual portrait at 18mm.

Christmas in the cathedral

A few images from the performance of the Christmas Oratorio by J.S. Bach at the Nidaros Cathedral. Due to the ongoing corona-situation, the whole setup of the orchestra and choir was different and movement was restricted, but I kind of like the framing and “peering through”-feeling those challenges presented.

Musical architecture and more

The Trondheim Symphony Orchestra & Opera recently performed the Christmas Oratorio by J.S. Bach at the Nidaros Cathedral in Trondheim, a tradition before the Christmas holidays.

The cathedral has just finished installing a completely new lighting setup, which really showcases the (vast) space. This was also the first time that I could test my latest lens purchase, the Leica 18mm Super Elmar for the M-system.

All these shots were captured handheld using the Leica M10 and the Visoflex typ 020 electronic viewfinder. This lens may be tiny in its stature, but it’s a beast when it comes to perspective and performance. These images can almost be considered as snapshots since no tripod was used (shutter speed of 1/30s) and subsequently the ISO-values were pretty high at 6400.

It was exciting to finally be able to take in so much of the architecture, in one single frame.

The impressive organ pipes served in my mind as “musical architecture”.

More images from the performance and a group portrait will follow shortly.

A Journey with Mozart

Leif Ove Andsnes preparing an all Mozart-program with the musicians of the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra & Opera in October 2020.

It is an absolute joy to stand “ringside” and hear the results of that intensive listening process and the subsequent interaction between the soloist and the orchestra. A journey of discovery that never ends.

Going live in 2020

A few sample images from The Trondheim International Chamber Music Festival 2020.

Mark Padmore, tenor

Saskia Giorgini, piano

Quatuor Van Kuijk

Power couple

I had the pleasure of documenting the onstage working relationship between husband and wife, conductor James Gaffigan and violinist Camilla Kjøll. They shared the stage as conductor and soloist for the first time, working with the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra & Opera.

In the time of COVID-19 and general social distancing, it was absolutely lovely to observe the physical presence and passion for both the music and each other.