I’ve been a big fan of the Hardanger fiddle for many years now, and Benedicte Maurseth, who grew up in Norway’s mountainous Hardanger region, has become one of my favorite practitioners. Her previous recording Harr was one of my favorites of 2022, and I wasn’t alone. She was the recipient of the Nordic Music Prize for 2022, a prize that includes musicians from Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Iceland and has had nominees such as Björk, Jenny Hval, First Aid Kit, Dungen, Neneh Cherry and Lykke Li.
Mirra in some ways picks up where Harr left off, continuing to explore the sounds both human and natural of the vast Hardangervidda plateau. Once again, and in an even deeper way this time, Maurseth and her collaborators unselfconsciously weave a tapestry from diverse threads: folk, jazz, ambient, minimalism, and music concréte, the latter in the form of field recordings of native wildlife. On HarrMirra the focus is on wild reindeer. The title itself is a dialect word from Hardanger for when a reindeer herd runs in a circular pattern for protection and warmth.
This is a deeply immersive work, its themes, motifs and sounds moving in patterns that repeat and modulate. The entire work follows the reindeer’s annual cycle of birth, searching for food, near constant movement and grazing, and incorporates the grunting and pawing sounds they make as they feed and interact. The titles of the eight pieces that make up this suite reflect this cycle, such as: “Windy Days,” “The Calf Rises,” Hunting March,” “Fresh Snow Over Reindeer Moss,” “A Flock Of Birds Under The Moon.”
In the liner notes Maurseth says she has only encountered reindeer in the wild twice in her life. “This despite growing up in the mountains, at Maurset in Eidfjord, right at the base of the vast mountain plateau where I’ve wandered for years in every direction. There too, the reindeer have wandered for thousands of years. So they’ve never been far away, even though they remain elusive.” She goes on to describe some of the sounds captured and paired with her music: “They communicate with grunts and clicking sounds from their hooves, whether they step on wet marshland or hard ice. They live in herds — all to survive in this seemingly desolate landscape filled with rocks, glaciers, snow, rivers, heather, and moraines. This is where they belong.”
As on her previous recording, she is joined by Håkon Mørch Stene on drums and a plethora of percussion (vibraphone, glockenspiel, handbells, electronics, occasional 12-string guitar, and something called Koka’s rotary magnetic bow) Mats Eilertsen on bass and electronics, and Morten Qvenild on keyboards (piano, harmonium, harpsichord, autoharp, synths, and (yay!) marxophone), who also recorded the album, which was produced by at Maurseth and Jørgen Træen. It’s impossible to slot Mirra into any genre but it’s obviously based in folk music and involves much improvisation. Maurseth and her collaborators evince a deep respect for their nation’s folk music, traditional folk instruments, and the natural world around them while remaining open to coloring outside the lines of tradition.
There is less here of melody than on Harr, with layers of bass, keyboards and electronics providing a droning, whispering or sighing foundation for Maurseth’s fiddle explorations. Stene’s percussion often is just as prominent as the fiddle, variously providing drive and color to the proceedings. “The Calf Rises” is a delightfully tender piece combining plucked strings and Maurseth bowing a suggestion of a springlike tune. “Summer Grazing” is driven by Qvineld’s marxophone played in a circular pattern, electronic flutterings and squeals suggesting the hordes of mosquitoes that plague the reindeer, and a loping tune that rises out of and subsides into the background. Eilertsen’s plucked bass dominates on “Hunting March” as reindeer and humans move stealthily through the autumnal landscape.
The Hardanger fiddle plays a most prominent role, along with the field recordings, on the final two pieces, “Fresh Snow Over Reindeer Moss” and “A Flock Of Birds Under The Moon.” I find myself transfixed by both. The former pairs the fiddle with Qvenild on piano, together evoking the title with assistance from a host of other species of the region, many of them threatened and endangered: snowy owl, arctic fox, wolverine, Lapland bunting, whimbrel, curlew, golden plover, scaup, gyrfalcon, green-winged teal, common scoter, long-tailed duck, marsh harrier. The final track features one of Maurseth’s most plaintive melodies, a repeated short motif that once again interacts with Qvenild’s piano in highly evocative ways.
The ensemble will be touring this work beginning with a stint in Australia in November, including a performance at the Sydney Opera House on November 23. In spring 2026, a tour begins on February 19 at Victoria National Jazz Scene in Oslo and concludes at Vossa Jazz in March. Updates at Maurseth’s website. She is also on Facebook.
(Hubro, 2025)
