Grete Pedersen

Among Scandinavia's most innovative and sought-after choral conductors, Grete Pedersen has been the director of the Norwegian Soloists' Choir since 1990. When she was young, she chose music over a star career as a Norwegian soccer player. Pedersen was born on October 1, 1960, in Sarpsborg in southern Norway but grew up on the island of Jeløya. At church, she took up the piano and began to accompany sacred singing. Showing obvious talent, she enrolled at the Norwegian Academy of Music in Oslo, studying choral conducting with Terje Kvam and Eric Ericson, graduating in 1988. She also studied with Kenneth Kiesler. In her late teens and early twenties, Pedersen seemed to be headed for a national-level career in Norwegian soccer. Playing for the Sprint/Jeløy SK club until 1982, she was named to Norway's national women's team and appeared in nine games in 1980 and 1981. However, when forced to choose between sports and music, she chose the latter. In 1984, she formed the Oslo Chamber Choir, which she directed until 2004. With that group, she developed novel forms of choral singing rooted in Norwegian folk music. Her major professional post has been with the Norwegian Soloists' Choir (Det Norske Solistchor), where she was named director in 1990 and where she remains as of the early 2020s. She made her recording debut with the group on the Simax label in 1998 with the album Lasse Thoresen: From Sweet-Scented Streams of Eternity. With the Norwegian Soloists' Choir, Pedersen has cultivated a diverse repertory that has included traditional choral repertory, including the Bach motets, Norwegian folk music, and 20th century and contemporary choral works. She has also been in demand as a guest conductor around Scandinavia and beyond, having appeared with the Berlin Radio Chorus, the SWR Vokalensemble Stuttgart, the Netherlands Radio Choir, and Pro Coro Canada, among other groups. Pedersen has conducted choral-orchestral works with the Norwegian Radio Orchestra, the Oslo Sinfonietta, and Ensemble Allegria. In 2007, the Norwegian Soloists' Choir moved to the BIS label, releasing an album of choral music by Grieg. Pedersen and the group have recorded there ever since, issuing such varied albums as White Nights: Impressions of Norwegian Folk Music (2011), J.S. Bach: The Motets (2017), and Luciano Berio: Coro, Cries of London (2020). Several of their albums have earned major European recording-industry awards. In 2023, Pedersen and the Norwegian Soloists' Choir issued the album Bent Sørensen: St. Matthew Passion. Pedersen is professor of choral conducting at the Norwegian Academy of Oslo. She is a Knight First Class of the Royal Norwegian Order of St. Olav. ~ James Manheim, Rovi