City in Norway. During the 16th century art music there was cultivated by the church, the grammar school and the official town musicians. Nils Mogensson (c1530–66) was the first organist at the cathedral. The first known contract for a town musician is dated 1591, although the post seems to have been well established by that time. Of the 18 town musicians appointed before 1848 (when the appointment was discontinued) the following were outstanding: L.J. Nattheide (appointed 1591), Povel Krøpelin (1669; d 1706), Rudolph Grip (1685; d 1716), O.P. Rødder (1789; d 1806) and F.G. Schediwy (1837–48). In 1671 Bergen appointed its first director of music, Peder Mogenssøn Wandel, who was succeeded by Søren Pedersen (from 1681), Anders Eckhoff (d 1718), Peder Stub (from 1719; d 1747) and Diderich Warnicke (d 1766). From the 16th century to the 18th the church choir consisted of grammar school pupils. Under Søren Linstrup (headmaster from 1696 to 1702) a series of church music dramas was performed.
In 1765 the Harmonien music society founded its own orchestra in Bergen, the Harmoniske Selskab (Harmonic Society), the first of its kind in Norway. Initiated by Jens Boalth and Claus Fasting, the orchestra had 20 members and gave weekly concerts of symphonies, chamber music and choral works. The first conductor was Samuel Lind (1765–9); his successors included Rødder (1785–1805), Ferdinand Rojahn (1856–9), A. Fries (1859–62 and 1864–73), Grieg (1880–82), Halvorsen (1893–9), Harald Heide (1905–48), Olav Kielland (1948–52), Arvid Fladmoe (1958–61), Karsten Andersen (1964–84), Aldo Ceccato (1984–90) and Dmitri Kitaienko (from 1990). In 1987 the orchestra (until then called the Musikselskab Harmoniens Orkester) was reorganized as the Bergen PO, with its own choir; in 1995 the orchestra and choir each had about 90 members. The orchestra has toured in Italy and elsewhere in Europe, as well as in the USA and Japan (1993).
The theatre Den Nationale Scene was founded in 1850 by the violinist and composer Ole Bull, and until the end of the 19th century many music dramas and operas were performed there by visiting companies. From 1894 Den Nationale Scene and Harmonien collaborated closely. The theatre had its own orchestra from 1902 to 1918. Opera Bergen, established in 1982, presents two major productions a year, using both professional and amateur performers.
The Bergen Festival was inaugurated in 1953. Each year a number of symphony, chamber, church and jazz concerts are held, as well as theatre and ballet performances, folklore and art exhibitions, in which both Norwegian and foreign artists participate. In 1953 the festival consisted of 22 events, but by the 1990s the annual number of events had risen to about 100. The director from 1994 was Ole Wiggo Bang. A large concert hall, the Grieghal, was opened in 1978.
The Bergen Musikkonservatorium was opened in 1905, on the initiative of T. Castberg. The first Norwegian music college was founded in Bergen in 1852 by the German-Norwegian composer Friedrich Vogel. The teacher-training college in Bergen opened a music department in 1958.
The city has several chamber music groups, including the Bergen Kammermusikforening (Chamber Music Society, founded 1935). The ensemble BIT20, established in 1989, specializes in contemporary music. Amateur music societies include the Bergen Handelsforenings Orkester (Trade Union Orchestra, 1941), and a number of choral societies, among them the Bergen Haandverks og Industriforbunds Sangforening (1847), the Søraas Kor (1882) and the Concordia society (1923). The Bergen Domkantori choir (founded 1971) has won prizes in Norway and abroad. The city also has several military bands. A piano factory was opened in Bergen in 1896 by Jakob Knudsen.
Composers who have worked in Bergen include Bull, Grieg, Sverre Jordan and Harald Saeverud. Troldhaugen, Grieg’s home, was completed in 1885, and remains as it was during the composer’s lifetime, as a museum, augmented by a visitor centre and a recital hall, where chamber concerts are held during the annual festival. A collection, established in 1906, of Grieg’s manuscripts and letters is in the Bergen public library (N-Bo). The 150th anniversary of Grieg's birth in 1993 prompted a series of cultural events.
A.E. Erichsen: Bergens kathedralskoles historie (Bergen, 1906)
C. Geelmuyden and H. Schetelig, eds.: Bergen 1814–1914 (Bergen, 1914–19)
A.M. Weisener: Om stadsmusikantene i Bergen (Bergen, 1943)
A. Berg and O. Mosby: Musikselskabet Harmonien 1765–1945 (Bergen, 1945–9)
B. Volle: Om stadsmusikantene i Bergen 1620–1759 (diss., U. of Oslo, 1979)
K.F. Johannessen and S. Steen: ‘The Grieg Collection in the Bergen Public Library’, SMN, xix (1993), 55–8
R. Storaas: ‘Grieg, the Bergensian’, SMN, xix (1993), 45–54
KARI MICHELSEN