The two main works on this recording are among the peaks of twentieth-century Norwegian orchestral music. Irgens-Jensen’s Passacaglia won second prize in the Nordic section of the 1928 Schubert centenary composing competition, and its admirers included Stravinsky and Toscanini.

His only purely orchestral Symphony, recorded here for the first time in the three-movement form that Irgens-Jensen originally conceived, expresses the depth of his feelings about the human and natural world during the dark days of World War Two. The disc is completed by his brief, touching orchestral Air.

Since 2007, Bjarte Engeset has been artistic director of Dala Sinfoniettan symphony orchestra in Sweden. His recordings of Norwegian orchestral music by Grieg and Tveitt have been widely acclaimed.