He studied flute with Aksel Andersen in Oslo and at the Paris conservatory with Philippe Gaubert. He celebrated his debut in Oslo in 1922 and became a member of the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra three years later. There he succeeded Rolf Schüttauf, the orchestra’s German solo flutist who had become a member of the Gestapo in 1940 and was shot by the resistance in early 1945 during a Gestapo campaign in Haugsbygd near Oslo.