Balladen om Bjørnen is by far the weightiest among the relatively few large-scale art-songs from Nielsen's later years. The text was written by Aage Berntsen at Nielsen's request. The fair ink copy is end-dated 9 January 1924, though he already on 15 November 1923 wrote to his son-in-law that he had finished the work. See more about this work at The Royal Library