The young Grieg was on his way to Italy with his friend Rikard Nordraak in 1865 when Nordraak fell ill and remained behind in Berlin. The following spring, Grieg learned that his friend had died of consumption, and immediately began writing this memorial march as a way of working through his grief and perhaps atoning for leaving Nordraak behind.

Grieg wrote this march for piano, later scoring it for wind band and requesting that it be played at his own funeral. But upon Grieg's death no band was available, so Johan Halvorsen quickly scored it for full orchestra.

The work begins softly, at a measured pace, but soon rises in pitch and loudness to a state of both anguish and defiance; the music here resembles a portion of Berlioz's Symphonie funèbre et triomphale. The march music dies away and is replaced by a gentle, more folk-like tune. The opening material creates a loud, stern disruption, then falls away into a softer lament. This leads back to the gloomy, mysterious opening of the piece, and in fact a restatement of everything up to the little folk tune, which is now replaced by a slow, fading recessional.

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