Born: February 16th, 1920, Fredrikstadt (Norway)Died: December 15th, 1997, Oslo (Norway)
Nationality: Norwegian
In due course, the short impression below will be replaced with a more extensive career overview
BIOGRAPHY
Karsten Andersen studied at the Oslo
Musikkonservatorium and made his debut as a violinist in 1939. During the war
years, he was a member of the Filharmonisk Selskaps Orkester in Oslo. In 1947, he spent a
year in Siena, Italy, to study at the Accademia
Chigiana.
Between 1945 and 1964, Andersen lived in Stavanger, where he was
the conductor of the Stavanger Byorkester, a classical orchestra, as well as
the musical director of the entertainment orchestra of the local NRK
broadcasting station. In 1964, Andersen took up the job of conductor of the
Musikkselskabet Harmonien (the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra), which he would
fulfil for more than twenty years, moreover functioning as the ensemble’s
artistic director from 1966 onwards. Between 1970 and 1976, he also was the
principal conductor of the Sinfóníuhljómsveit Íslands (the Iceland Symphony
Orchestra). Over the years, Andersen made appearances as a guest conductor with
various renowned ensembles abroad, including the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (London) and the Moscow
Radio Symphony Orchestra.
Between 1985 and 1988, the year he retired from music,
he was a professor and musical director at the Norges Musikkhøgskole,
co-founding a youth orchestra, the Ungdomssymfonikerne (in collaboration with
Leif Jørgensen and Harry Kvebaek). During his career, Karsten Andersen composed
some modern classical works. For his services to Norwegian music, he was
rewarded with the Norsk Kulturråds Musikkpris (1974) and the Norske Stats
Kunstnerpris (1975).
EUROVISION SONG CONTEST
Karsten Andersen made one appearance in the Eurovision
Song Contest, in 1964, when he replaced the regular Norwegian conductor of
those years, Øivind Bergh; at that time, Bergh was in the United States
for reasons of study. Andersen, in one of his lasts assignments for NRK (he
resigned later in 1964 to work for the Harmonien in Bergen), conducted ‘Spiral’, a song composed by Sigurd Jansen and arranged by Carsten Klouman. Interpreted by Arne Bendiksen, this
effort came eighth in a field of sixteen entries. Jansen, Klouman, and Bendiksen all returned to the contest as conductors of Norwegian Eurovision
entries in their own right later onwards.
EUROVISION INVOLVEMENT YEAR BY YEAR
Country – Norway
Song title – "Spiral"
Lyrics – Egil Hagen
Conductor – Karsten Andersen
Score – 8th place (6 votes)
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