One learns only a little about this soundtrack music from the notes on the packaging, but it passes an important test for soundtrack music: it's interesting on its own. The music is for a Norwegian film, DeUsylige, translated as Troubled Water, and the organ music is diegetic (i.e., played by one of the characters in the film). The organ player, you can learn from a bit of Internet searching, is a child kidnapper who has been released from prison, and he tends to communicate his feelings by playing an organ in a small church where he has apparently found part-time work. It's an unusual concept, matched by music unlike anything else that has ever been recorded for the organ, although certainly people have played it like this on their own initiative. Some of the music is quasi-improvisatory, although organist
Iver Kleive
is credited as an arranger in all cases. Into this category fall two different treatments of
Simon & Garfunkel
's "
Bridge Over Troubled Water
," which apparently plays an important role in the film. The longer one (track 10) is an entirely original treatment of a popular song in the concert music realm, and it's well worth sampling. The rest of the music includes short original pieces on a specific emotional theme and renditions of existing pieces by
Vivaldi
and
Hans Leo Hassler
, as well as contemporary Norwegian composers, presumably the kind of thing that a church organist might play.
Kleive
, who is said to have experience in both church music and jazz, emerges as a musician of whom you want to hear more, and this disc is an especially intriguing outing from the quirky but always engaging Norwegian label
2L
.~James Manheim