Edvard Grieg was born in Bergen, Norway on 15 June 1843. His mother, Gesine B. Hagerup, became his first piano teacher. She taught him to play from the age of 6.
In the summer of 1858, Grieg met the eminent Norwegian violinist Ole Bull, who was a friend of the family. Bull noticed the 15-year-old boy's talent and persuaded his parents to send him to further develop his talents at the Leipzig Conservatory.
Grieg enrolled in the conservatory, concentrating on the piano, and enjoyed the numerous concerts and recitals given in Leipzig. He disliked the discipline of the conservatory course of study, yet he still achieved very good grades in most areas.
In the spring of 1860, Grieg survived a life-threatening lung disease. The following year he made his debut as a concert pianist, in Karlshamn, Sweden. In 1862, he finished his studies in Leipzig, and held his first concert in his home town of Bergen.
In 1863, Grieg went to Copenhagen, Denmark, and stayed there for three years. He met the Danish composers J. P. E. Hartmann and Niels Gade. He also met his fellow Norwegian composer Rikard Nordraak (composer of the Norwegian national anthem), who became a good friend and source of great inspiration.
On 11 June 1867, Grieg married his first cousin (a daughter of Edvard Hagerup), Nina Hagerup. The next year, their only child, Alexandra, was born. She died in 1869 from meningites. In the summer of 1868, Grieg wrote his Piano Concerto in A minor while on holiday in Denmark. Edmund Neupert gave the concerto its premiere performance on 3 April 1869 in the Casino Theater in Copenhagen. Grieg himself was unable to be there due to conducting commitments in Christiania (as Oslo was then named).
In 1868, Franz Liszt, who had not yet met Grieg, wrote a testimonial for him to the Norwegian Ministry of Education, which led to Grieg obtaining a travel grant. The two men met in Rome in 1870. On Grieg's first visit, they went over Grieg's Violin Sonata No. 1, which pleased Liszt greatly. On his second visit, in April, Grieg brought with him the manuscript of his Piano Concerto, which Liszt proceeded to sightread (including the orchestral arrangement).
In 1876, the same year Grieg attended the inauguration of the Richard Wagner Festival in Bayreuth, Grieg composed incidental music for the premiere of Henrik Ibsen's play Peer Gynt, at the request of the author. Many of the pieces from this work became very popular in the orchestral suites or piano and piano-duet arrangements.
Grieg had close ties with the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra (Harmonien), and later became Music Director of the orchestra from 1880–1882.
Grieg's later life brought him fame, and the Norwegian government awarded him a pension.
In the spring 1903, Grieg made nine 78-rpm gramophone recordings of his piano music in Paris; all of these historic discs have been reissued on both LPs and CDs and, despite limited fidelity, show his artistry as a pianist. Grieg also made live-recording player piano music rolls for the Welte-Mignon reproducing system, all of which survive today and can be heard.
Edvard Grieg died in the autumn of 1907, aged 64, after a long period of illness. The funeral drew between 30,000 and 40,000 people out on the streets of his home town to honor him. Following his wish, his own Funeral March in Memory of Rikard Nordraak was played in an orchestration by his friend Johan Halvorsen. His and his wife's ashes are entombed in a mountain crypt near his house, Troldhaugen in Bergen.
The original family name was spelled Greig, originally from Scotland.
Edvard Grieg drew inspiration from Norwegian folk music. Early works include a symphony (which he later suppressed) and a piano sonata. He also wrote three sonatas for violin and piano and a cello sonata. Grieg's many short pieces for piano — often based on Norwegian folk tunes and dances — led some to call him the "Chopin of the North".
The Piano Concerto is Grieg's most popular work. Some of the Lyric Pieces (for piano) are also well-known, as is the incidental music to Henrik Ibsen's play Peer Gynt, a play that Grieg found to be an arduous work to score properly.
Grieg's popular Holberg Suite was originally written for the piano, and later arranged by the composer for string orchestra.
Grieg wrote songs, in which he set lyrics by poets Heinrich Heine, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Henrik Ibsen, Hans Christian Andersen, Rudyard Kipling and others.