Gustaf Hägg

Gustaf Wilhelm Petersson Hägg (November 28, 1867 – February 2, 1925) was a Swedish organist and composer. Life Hägg was born in Visby, Gotland. He studied at the Royal Swedish College of Music receiving his organist’s degree in 1886 and his higher degree (kyrkosångar- och musiklärarexamen) in 1889. He was appointed organist of Klara Church in 1893 and began teaching harmony at the Royal College in 1904. In 1908 he began teaching organ and he was appointed professor of organ in 1915. He died in Stockholm. His “Legend” for reed organ has been republished by the Reed Organ Society; it is a short, highly chromatic piece of intermediate difficulty, somewhat in the style of Grieg. It begins in six-eight in d-minor, with a folklike theme repeated with variants over sustained chords. The second theme is more-or-less in E-major, but with many accidentals and a highly chromatic accompaniment in the left hand. After the second theme is developed, an abbreviated version of the original theme is restated, and then abruptly shifts from d-minor to D-major, where it is developed, briefly returning to a minor tonality before resolving on a drawn-out D-major chord. The story, one imagines, had a sai