Ludvig Irgens-Jensen

Paul Ludvig Irgens-Jensen (13 April 1894 – 11 April 1969) was a Norwegian twentieth-century composer. Biography Irgens-Jensen studied piano with Nils Larsen while a philology student at the University of Oslo. He began composing in 1920 and the radical nature of his work attracted some interest. In 1928, Irgens-Jensen submitted his Passacaglia for Orchestra to the International Schubert Competition to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Franz Schubert’s death. The competition was eventually won by Kurt Atterberg’s Symphony No. 6. Although Irgens-Jensen’s work only received second prize in the Scandinavian Composers Division, the work was performed all over the world and helped Irgens-Jensen gain international fame. In 1930, the composer achieved another great success with his choral symphonic work Heimferd, written to commemorate the 900th anniversary of the death of St. Olav II of Norway. This work won first prize in a composition competition and quickly became popular in Norway. Heimferd is now considered an important landmark in the history of Norwegian choral music. During the Second World War, Irgens-Jensen composed several songs and orchestral works to patriotic texts; due t