Ingvar Lidholm

Ingvar Lidholm (1921-2017) was a central figure in Swedish musical life. Lidholm was born in southern Sweden, and he grew up in a religious environment, which naturally involved music as well as existential questions. During the Second World War he studied at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm, among other subjects violin and viola with Axel Runnqvist and conducting with Tor Mann. This was where he met Karl-Birger Blomdahl, who was of vital importance for him as a friend and colleague. He studied polyphony and composition individually with Hilding Rosenberg, who also instilled in him a sense of artistic ethics. From the circle of students around Rosenberg a gathering was formed, the so-called Monday Group, which in many ways came to contribute to the modernisation of Swedish musical life for the following half-century. Lidholm was, together with the conductor Herbert Blomstedt, the first Swedish composer in Darmstadt; he travelled to Italy with Blomdahl and studied the twelve-tone technique with Matyas Seiber in London. Elements from decades of stylistic development – from Hindemith to Ligeti and Lutoslawski – permeated and coloured Lidholm´s music. Lidholm was in Örebro as conductor of the town´s orchestra 1947-56; after that he became head of chamber music at the Swedish Radio. In 1965 he succeeded Karl-Birger Blomdahl as professor in composition at the Royal College of Music and developed, together with Bo Wallner, the composition seminar, that attracted guest teachers such as Ligeti and Lutoslawski. Folke Rabe, Sven-David Sandström, Daniel Börtz, Miklos Maros and Anders Eliasson were among Lidholm´s students. In 1975 he returned to the Swedish Radio, this time as planning director. Lidholm´s operatic works – above all A Dream Play and the TV opera The Dutchman – were devoted to August Strindberg, whose texts were also set to music in songs and choral works. The composer had a unique, sensual feeling for the human voice. He interacted for sixty years with the legendary choir conductor Eric Ericson. They met as young men in Stockholm in 1943, when the Chamber Choir was founded. In the series of Lidholm´s large-scale choral works – from Laudi to Canto LXXXI, a riveder le stelle, Libera me and Greek Grave Relief – seminal ideas are articulated that hark back to earlier ages of our cultural heritage. In the same way, Ingvar Lidholm´s orchestral works form the backbone of Swedish music, from the 23-year-old´s highly acclaimed debut work Toccata e Canto (1945) to the masterpieces Ritornell, Motus-Colores, Poesis, Greetings, Kontakion and the ballet Rites, which renewed music´s structural technique, timbre, form and capacity of expression. He was especially pleased with Herbert Blomstedt´s interpretations of his orchestral works.