Leif Ove Andsnes Brings New Life to Tveitt’s Only Surviving Piano Sonata on New Album

 It was a bit of a bold move when Leif Ove Andsnes decided to program Geirr Tveitt’s Piano Sonata No. 29 ‘Sonate etere’ in 35 concerts across Europe and North America in 2024 and 2025. However, in Andsnes’ words, it is “the most ambitious solo piano piece by any Norwegian composer”, and bold move or not, audiences went wild for it. His Carnegie Hall performance of Geirr Tveitt’s Sonata No. 29 was hailed as one of the ‘Best Classical Performances of 2025’ by The New York Times. On this album, Andsnes pairs the sonata with a selection of solo piano works from Fifty Folk Tunes from Hardanger, Op. 150 and a selection of Tveitt’s Songs that he performs together with his sister, singer Solveig Andsnes.

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In 1970, a devastating fire destroyed Geirr Tveitt’s house and an estimated 300 compositions burnt to ashes. Roughly 80% of his oeuvre was lost forever, including all of the piano sonatas he wrote except for Sonata No. 29 ‘Sonata etere’. This sonata only survived because it had been sent to Norsk Musikkforlag to be published.

In Andsnes’ words, the Sonata etere “is a gigantic piece of music built on two simple melodies with many variations. It is a tough piece to play, but very rewarding. With Russian rhythmic influences combined with touches of French music and folk music, Tveitt really is in a world all his own. It is fantastically colourful in its writing for the instrument, full of tension in its architecture, harmony, and rhythm.” The album also includes a selection of solo piano pieces from Femti folkatonar fråo Hardanger (Fifty Folk Tunes from Hardanger). 

The Songs, in which he fuses folk elements with modernist harmonic language, are set to poetry by leading Norwegian poets of Tveitt’s era. On these songs he also collaborates professionally with his sister Solveig Andsnes for the first time. - “While working with the sonata I began thinking about Tveitt’s songs,” Andsnes explains. “They lie somewhere between classical lieder, folk songs and art songs, and it felt natural to explore them together with Solveig, whose background is in musical theatre and jazz.”

The album was recorded at St Jude-on-the-Hill in London in July 2025, with Jørn Pedersen as producer and Arne Akselberg as recording engineer. It is available on CD, a limited LP version with a selection of the songs, digitally, and in Dolby Atmos. 

LEIF OVE VISITED THE FARMHOUSE 

Geirr Tveitt’s children have built a new farmhouse in the same historical style on the exact same site of the one that burned down. In February 2026, Leif Ove Andsnes visited Tveitt’s now 80-year-old daughter Gyri Tveitt at the site, surrounded by a stunning landscape of deep fjords, towering mountains, massive glaciers, and roaring waterfalls in the breathtaking Hardanger region in Western Norway. 

Leif Ove talked at length with Gyri about her father Geirr Tveitt, saw and held the charred manuscripts, and played on Tveitt’s piano. The instrument, on which the 29th Sonata was composed, was stationed in a house higher up the hill when the farmhouse burned down.