Nordic Highlights 3 2016

nordic

HIGHLIGHTS

3/2016

N E W S L E T T E R F RO M G E H R M A N S M U S I K F Ö R L A G & F E NNIC A G E H R M A N

7 questions for Harri Wessman

Dante Anarca

NEWS Rautavaara in memoriam

Colourstrings licensed in China

Einojuhani Rautavaara died in Helsinki on 27 July at the age of 87. One of the most highly regarded and inter­nationally best-known Finnish com­posers, he wrote eight symp­ honies, vocal and choral works, chamber and instrumental music as well as numerous concertos, orchestral works and operas, the last of which was Rasputin (2001–03).

Rautavaara’s international breakthrough came with his , when keen crit7th symphony, Angel of Light (1994) ics likened him to Sibelius. His best-beloved orchestral for birds and orchestra, work is the Cantus arcticus for which he personally recorded the sounds of the birds.

Apart from being an acclaimed composer, Rautavaara had a fine intellect, was a mystical storyteller and had a masterly command of words. He was “the midwife of his compositions” and his task was to “deliver the music intact”. Like his music, many of his quotes have become cultural classics.

Fennica Gehrman has signed an agreement with the leading Chinese publisher, the People’s Music Publishing House, on the licensing of the teaching material for the Colourstrings violin method in China. The agreement covers a long and extensive partnership over publication of the material and also includes plans for teacher training in China. The Colourstrings method developed by Géza and Csaba Szilvay has spread far and wide in the world and is regarded as a first-class teaching method for stringed instruments.

Complete Vigilia in New York Einojuhani Rautavaara’s extensive choral All-Night-Vigil (Vigilia) will receive its NY premiere in its complete form at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, New York City on 15 November. Maestro Kent Tritle will conduct the Great Choir, and the soloists will be Halley Gilbert, soprano, Sara Murphy, mezzo-soprano, Marc Day, tenor, Malcolm Merriweather, baritone and Matt Boehler, bass.

Albert Schnelzer´s successful concert opener A Freak in Burbank will receive its US West Coast premiere by the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra under the direction of Thomas Dausgaard on 29 and 30 October.

Conducted by Jaime Martin, the Royal

Liverpool Philharmonic will give the English premiere of the oboe concerto The Enchanter on 26 January with Francois Leleux as soloist. During the coming season BIS Records will begin its recordings to what will become two portrait CDs with Schnelzer’s chamber and orchestral music.

Erik Bergman choral discs Choral music by Erik Bergman (1911–2006), the Grand Old Man of Finnish choral music, is soon available on two major sets of discs. Alba Records has released an impressive triple CD of his male choir works under the title Bergmaniana. Matti Hyökki conducts the Bergmania Ensemble and the male voices of the Sibelius Academy Vocal Ensemble, and the soloists include Petri Bäckström, Sampo Haapaniemi, Iida Antola and Rabbe Österholm. BIS records will release a two-disc set of Bergman’s works for mixed choir recorded by the Helsinki Chamber Choir; the conductor is Nils Schweckendiek. The CD box is scheduled to appear in early 2017. nordic

HIGHLIGHTS

3/2016

NEWSLE T TER FROM GEHRMANS MUSIKFÖRLAG & FENNICA GEHRMAN

Sound samples , video clips and other material are available at www.gehrmans.se/highlights www.fennicagehrman.fi/highlights Cover photos: Sven-David Sandström’s opera The Performance (Martina Holmberg), Harri Wessman (Liisa Wessman), Sakari Oramo conducting Dante Anarca (Jan-Olav Wedin) Editors: Henna Salmela and Kristina Fryklöf Translations: Susan Sinisalo and Robert Carroll Design: Göran Lind ISSN 2000-2742 (Print), ISSN 2000-2750 (Online) Printed in Sweden by TMG Sthlm, Bromma 2016

H i ghl i ghts

3/2016

Heidi Kuusava, Ari Nieminen, Henna Salmela and Géza Szilvay at the Beijing Conservatory.

New opera by Sandström Sven-David Sandströms´s chamber opera Föreställningen (The Performance) had its premiere at the Royal Opera during the Baltic Sea Festival in Stockholm in August.

The plot takes place at Salpetrière Hospital in 19th-century Paris where three women, as part of their treatment, are to appear before the world famous physician Jean Martin Charcot and a distinguished audience. Katarina Frostenson´s powerful text and Sandström´s dynamic music picture the women, their innermost struggle, selfcontempt and pain, but also the empathy that arises between them. The roles were sung by Tre Donne: Jeanette Köhn, Katija Dragojevic and Miriam Treichl, that also initiated the project. (See: Reviews)

Lindberg conducts Pettersson Christian Lindberg will conduct Staatsorchester Saarbrücken in three of Allan Pettersson´s Barefoot Songs this October.

Baritone James Bobby is the soloist and it will be the first time that these songs are sung in German. In October/November Lindberg and the Norwegian Arctic Philharmonic will go on tour with Pettersson´s Symphony No. 7 in Norway, Sweden, Finland and Lithuania.

Lindberg will also conduct the 7th with the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra on 9 and 10 November, in a concert programme opening with the world premiere of the sketches to the seventeenth symphony that Pettersson left behind unfinished. It will be almost ten minutes of music that Lindberg has compiled.

Photo: Mats Bäcker

Schnelzer in LA and London

P re m ieres

Nuorvala in the MCME concert series

Photo: Alliyah Breitenstein

Chamber music by Juhani Nuorvala can be heard at a series of three concerts in Russia – in Perm and Moscow – on 23–26 September. The Moscow Contemporary Music Ensemble will play his Five Pieces for Flute and , Ruoikkohuhuilu and Pianotarha, and Clarinet, Boost Nuorvala will himself play in the performances (electronics, live electronics and keyboard). The concerts will also include Finnish video art and music by young composers recommended by Nuorvala and chosen by the performers.

Autumn 2016 LARS KARLSSON

Clarinet Concerto

Lapland CO/John Storgårds, sol. Christoffer Sundqvist 28.9. Rovaniemi, Finland

ANNA-KARIN KLOCKAR

Två sånger om kärlek

(Two Songs about Love) La Cappella Ladies Choir/Tony Margeta 29.9. Uppsala, Sweden

MARIE SAMUELSSON

Awards and nominations

Nordic CO/Sarah Ioannides 8.10. Sundsvall, Sweden PHOTO: Marco Feklistoff

Photo: Maarit Kytöharju

The Finnish Music Publishers Association chose Lotta Wennä­koski as the Composer of the Year in September. The Gramophone wrote last year that this composer has long been considered ‘one to watch’ in Finland.

Mats Larsson Gothe’s “…de Blanche et Marie…” – Symphony has been nominated for the Nordic Council´s Music No. 3 Prize 2016. According to the jury the symphony is “an exceptional work in which the harmony has a direction that continuously takes us on to different spaces and moods.

Larsson Gothe invites the listener to contemplation as well as challenge in a wilful and beautiful universe of tones.”

Eros Effect and Solidarity – Love Trilogy No. 3

Horácio Ferreira, clarinet 19.10. London (Barbican), UK

KALEVI AHO

Double Concerto for English Horn and Harp

DeFilharmonie/Martyn Brabbins, sol. Anneleen Lenaerts, harp, Dimitri Mestdag, cor anglais 21.10. Antwerp, Belgium

Operas on stage in 2017

Violin Concerto No. 2

Kymi Sinfonietta/Eugene Tzigane, sol. Elina Vähälä 30.11. Kotka, Finland

KAI NIEMINEN

Frammenti dal buio PHOTO: Gustaf Waesterberg

A production by the Finnish Chamber Opera of the new opera Hemingway by Timo-Juhani Kyllönen is to be staged in Espoo in September 2017. Singing the leading roles will be Sauli Tiilikainen, Monica Groop, Petri Lindroos and Mari Palo, and the stage director is Vilppu Kiljunen. The libretto by Maritza Núñez is based on the life of Ernest Hemingway.

Also to be premiered next year is the opera Aino Ackté by Ilkka Kuusisto, when arts folk in the Savonlinna region combine forces to put on a joint production. The opera is about the singer Aino Ackté, a dedicated artist who became internationally famous and created the Savonlinna Opera Festival. The world premiere is scheduled for 28 October.

by Kari Tikka is a very fitThe opera Luther ting choice for the 500th anniversary of the Reformation in 2017, and there are plans for performances in Finland, plus two in Germany during the autumn.

Those in the towns of Isny and Wangen will be given by the Wangen Oratorio Choir and the Opernbühne Württembergisches Allgäu conducted by FriedrichWilhelm Möller.

KIMMO HAKOLA

Creazy Op. 94

Norrbotten NEO gives an Eliasson portrait The chamber ensemble Norrbotten NEO has recorded four works by Anders Eliasson on BIS Records: Notturno, Senza risposte, the piano quartet Fogliame and Trio for Violin, Vibraphone and Piano. The CD is scheduled to be released in connection with Norrbotten NEO’s Eliasson portrait concert at the Stockholm Concert Hall on 12 March next year. The concert programme will also , which Eliasson include Fantasia per sei strumenti wrote on commission for the ensemble in 2009.

Trio La Rue (Virva Garam, piano, Susanna Arminen, violin, Markus Pelli, cello) 26.10. Roma (Villa Lante), Italy

PER GUNNAR PETERSSON

An Anonymous Nun´s Prayer

SVEN-DAVID SANDSTRÖM

O Sacrum Convivum

Mogens Dahl Chamber Choir/Mogens Dahl 6.11. Copenhagen, Denmark

LOTTA WENNÄKOSKI

Sedecim

Sibelius Academy SO/Atso Almila 18.11. Lahti, Finland

JACOB MÜHLRAD

Skall aldrig mer finnas

(Will Be No More) Petri Singers, string ensemble/Alexander Einarsson 20.11. Malmö, Sweden

Blomdahl and Malmlöf-Forssling centenaries This year we are celebrating the centenaries of Karl-Birger Blomdahl (1916-1968) and Carin Malmlöf-Forssling (1916-2005). Best known for his opera Aniara (1958), Blomdahl was one of the leading Swedish modernists of his time. In Gehrmans catalogue you will find his orchestral works from the 1940s, when his music was influenced by the Baroque and Paul Hindemith. They include Concerto Grosso, Pastoral Suite, Preludio e allegro, Symphony No. 2 and the Stage Music from the Walpurgis Night.

Carin Malmlöf-Forssling studied composition with Nadia Boulanger in Paris.

She was a pioneer among Swedish female composers and the first, and for many years the only female member of the Society of Swedish Composers. In our catalogue you will find the expressive Release for string orchestra, the vigorous Orizzonte for solo horn, the Silver Quartet (String Quartet No. 1), Ahimsa and other choral works, as well as a number of beautiful solo songs.

H i ghl i ghts

3/2016

Seven questions for Harri Wessman

1

How did you come to music?

I came to music at the school in Tapiola where, in the early 1960s, Erkki Pohjola had founded the Tapiola Choir that later became famous the world over. I played the cello and double bass in the chamber orchestra that accompanied it. My image of how music should sound to a great extent derives from that time. I love the sound of a children’s choir and strings, but I’ve always been a bit afraid of winds and things that rattle. It was also around then that I became close friends with Jaakko Ilves the violinist, Risto Poutanen the cellist, Ilmo Ranta the pianist and Jarmo Kankaanpää the bassist. I have written two piano trios for the Ilves–Poutanen–Ranta Trio – the Tapiola Trio. In spirit they are in the “neopathos” style that, back in those early days and with a touch of playful self-irony, we called our “school”.

We wanted to put across the emotional dimension of music at a time when it wasn’t fashionable in modern, and certainly not avant-garde circles.

2

Which works of yours mean the most to you?

I used to get a bit annoyed that my old song Water under Snow is Weary (Vesi väsyy lumen alle) for choir is particularly highly rated at the expense of my other works. After all, I wrote the first version back in 1973, when my composition studies had barely got under way. I suppose I would have liked some later, more ambitious work to evoke similar reactions. I don’t think quite like that any more. It’s an advantage for any composer to have one piece that is played and recorded over and over again. New CDs with this choral work of mine are constantly being released in the United States. The international success of this song was undoubtedly influenced by the fact that the Tapiola Choir sang it on its international tours in the 1970s and 80s.

The words are by the Estonian poetess Eha Lättemäe (1922–2012), who used engaging and purposely naive imagery to weave her poems. Beneath them it is possible to discern a second level, the one she used to escape from the pressure to which she was subjected.

She was not allowed to do the work for which she was trained or to travel abroad. What sort of metaphor is there hidden in the opening words Water under snow is weary, under ice it stretches sleeping?

I wrote the Trumpet Concerto in 1987 as a commission from the Kemi Music Institute for 17-year-old Pasi Pirinen. He gave it a masterly performance, and even now I still look upon it as one of my best compositions. In some places it’s H i ghl i ghts

3/2016

quite romantic, in others dance-like. Jouko Harjanne recorded it with the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra conducted by Leif Segerstam, and Ole Edvard Antonsen later made an equally brilliant recording for BIS, with the Sundsvall Chamber Orchestra conducted by Christian Lindberg.

3

How do you believe your music comes across to the listener?

Most people regard music as emotional communication, unless they’re the type who hear music more as a sort of aural architecture, as a sound construct, as mobile acoustic forms. These approaches are not mutually exclusive, and the emotional communication dimension is, I believe, also possible in a wilder and less traditional idiom.

4

Where do you find the inspiration for your compositions?

The majority of my compositions have been commissions, and luckily they incorporate a social aspect: they’ve been for a particular performer or performers. Communicating with the musicians is extremely inspiring. The commissions have also had a fixed deadline, and that’s a good stick for lazybones. I don’t seek inspiration in a birch forest, or walking along the seashore; I’m happiest in an urban environment. Yet I consider myself lucky if I have sufficient time on my own, and peace and quiet while work is in process – but also to be able to discuss things with the future performer.

5

How would you describe your composition process and your musical language?

All kinds of material interest me: timbres, rhythm, harmony, melody, technology, folk music. At one time I derived great strength from the book Twentieth Century Harmony by Vincent Persichetti.

Also important was the thorough grounding in jazz harmony I received from Eero Koivistoinen at the Sibelius Academy. Joonas Kokkonen taught me for nearly a decade with the patience of a psychotherapist and succeeded in inoculating me with a technique for making musical motifs and ideas evolve into bigger and psychologically coherent units. Critics have sometimes described my music as gently dissonant and dance-like, and also melodic. I do not refute this. The composition process has a close affinity with another art I love, namely cooking. There is a magnificent description in the

Photo: Liisa Wessman

Finnish composer Harri Wessman loves the sound of a choir and strings. His pieces for children are popular with teachers, and the critics have described his music as gently dissonant and dance-like, and also melodic. He compares the compositional process with another art he loves, namely cooking.

Danish film Babette’s Feast directed by Gabriel Axel of what cooking is fundamentally all about.

6

And what about your pieces for teaching purposes? How do they take shape and what must you bear in mind when composing them?

Writing pieces for teaching purposes alongside other works has turned out to be a lengthy project.

Maybe sometime during my lifetime I’ll manage to produce pieces suitable for all instruments and the different Music Institute grade exams. I don’t write children’s music. Stylistically I write in the same way as for professionals; technically, the pieces just have to be easier to play. Most difficult of all is writing for children who are complete beginners. The pieces need to be rich in expression, and in order to achieve this, you have to make full use of everything that’s idiomatic in the instrument. You also have to include elements that are natural to the present day and age: timbres, special effects that are easy to produce, and so on. Not just for the sake of it, however, but to reinforce the musical message.

How can you do this when experience has shown that if you commission composers to write pieces suitable for children, they turn out to be too difficult? To avoid this, I dedicate works to a specific young player working for a particular exam. With the pupil and teacher I run through the techniques that the child already masters and those that still are required before taking the grade exam. I find out how fast the player can handle staccatos, whether the young clarinettist can manage frullato, and so on.

That done, I know the limitations and the recipe.

7

What plans do you have for new compositions?

I’ve got a commission from the Lauttasaari Music Institute for a Concertino for Flute and String Orchestra in which the young virtuoso Peppi Kajoluoto has agreed to be the soloist. Another interesting challenge is a Concerto for Viola D’amore for SirkkaLiisa Kaakinen-Pilch. I remember the words of Joonas Kokkonen when I tell myself a composer should work hard. He once said in a different context: “In certain circumstances, even a composer, deserves to be sacked.” So start notating – pronto – and carpe diem. Life is not as long as we’d like!

H enn a S a l m el a

Photos: Jan-Olav Wedin

Dante Anarca – ‘‘a future classic” Conductor Sakari Oramo was in hospital with pneumonia on the day that he was scheduled to premiere “Dante Anarca” in Stockholm in 1998. But eighteen years later, on 11 March this year, when Anders Eliasson´s monumental oratorio was performed for the second time in history, Oramo stood on the podium at the Stockholm Concert Hall together with some 180 singers and musicians.

He pronounced the work “a future classic”. Journalist Maria Schottenius met him for an interview before the performance in March.

What do you feel towards the work today?

– I feel small before it. We have a great deal of work ahead of us. But I certainly enjoy it. The music is actually written in a way that is rather practical.

Not difficult. Rather simple. But it still contains many colours and dimensions.

– It is a great event that the work now will be performed again. And the audience should receive the music with an open mind. It is really immediately pleasing music.

W o r k on the o r ato r i o got started when the Italian author Giacomo Oreglia (1924-2007), active in Sweden, sent a manuscript to composer Anders Eliasson in the year 1993. Oreglia wanted Eliasson to set to music his poem Dante Anarca e i suoi sei maestri (Dante the Anarch and his ‘six masters’: Virgil, the Virgin Mary, Gioacchino de Fiore, St. Francis of Assisi, Siger of Brabant, and Dante himself ). The work is inspired by texts from the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance, and deals with spirituality and uprising, reconciliation and visions of the future. It was not until 1998, when Stockholm was appointed the Culture Capital of the year, that this composition was finished after an intensive period toward the end of which Eliasson worked 18 hours a day with pen and paper to meet the deadline.

Has Anders Eliasson caught up with his times?

– Yes indeed, he has a great potential to become successful internationally as well.

– He deserved an artistic gold medal for what he achieved, says Tony Lundman, who in 2012 published a biography of Anders Eliasson (1947-2013).

– This is his magnum opus, and the lyrical qualities in works that he wrote later, in the first decades of the 21st century, are already noticeable here, he says.

– It includes all the fascinating dimensions that made him one of our century´s finest composers.

But the work was forgotten. What pained Eliasson, just as much as the cancer when he was dying, was the awareness that he would never get to experience another performance of Dante Anarca.

Conductor Sakari Oramo tells what he was thinking during the rehearsals of the work then, in 1998, and now.

– I remember that I thought, Wow, one can do it this way too! The music was sparse; the thick sonorities that were common in the 90´s were totally absent. But Eliasson was of course an unusual person, he wasn´t at home in our time, says Oramo.

– I also thought about how he tackled the many homages in the text, “O Saint Francis” and so on.

We don´t have the culture of homage here. It is not Swedish, not Finnish, not at all Nordic. And I wondered what Anders Eliasson was thinking there. For he was not exactly a person who paid homage liberally, rather the opposite.

What did he do then?

– He brought out the homages a few times, underlined them, and passed them up other times. He was of course a man of the opposition in musical life; he was no mainstream modernist, but at the same time quite modern when he allowed his music to grow out of a modernised harmony.

What do you see now that you didn´t see then?

– I tend to see now that some sections are extremely sober and others, like the humble moments in the third movement “La candida rosa”, are moving in an almost religious way. Devoted, says Oramo.

Is it a matter of interpreting the text or personal conviction on Eliasson´s part?

– I think both. What it means is a mystery.

How would you place Eliasson among other composers?

– When I read Dante Anarca I often think of Igor Stravinsky´s neoclassical works, but also KarlBirger Blomdahl´s music, as the nearest Swedish comparison. But Anders would probably have said, “Hell no!” says Sakari Oramo.

M a ri a S c h o tteni u s This interview was published in Dagens Nyheter on 8 March 2016.

Footnotes * Anders Eliasson’s Dante Anarca was performed on 11 and 13 March by the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, Eric Ericson Chamber Choir (extended to 70 singers) and soloists Ingela Brimberg, soprano, Anna Larsson, alto, Michael Weinus, tenor and Gabriel Suovanen, baritone, conducted by Sakari Oramo. * The International Anders Eliasson Society, based in Vienna, was formed in connection with the performances of Dante Anarca in March, and with Sakari Oramo as one of its honorary members.

Chairman of the society is Dr. Peter Kislinger, broadcaster at the ORF (Austrian Radio/Ö1). The purpose of the society is to spread knowledge of the composer Anders Eliasson, and to promote performances, recordings and research of his music. Please visit the society´s home page: anders-eliasson-society.com, where you will also find information about how to become a member.

H i ghl i ghts

3/2016 3

REVIEWS With the aid of a small ensemble from the Academy of St Martin-in-the-Fields his [Hardenberger’s] trumpet hit stratospheric heights in Tobias Broström’s high-flying “Sputnik” Financial Times 9.8.

Tobias Broström’s piece whizzed, spiralled and spluttered for five minutes, with Håkan Hardenberger’s piercing piccolo trumpet leading strings and piano.

Classical Source 8.8.

Tobias Broström: Sputnik

UK premiere: Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields/Håkan Hardenberger, 6.8.2016 London (BBC Proms), UK

Rare gems on Melartin disc Major composers in Finland’s musical history deserve to be released from the shadow of Sibelius. Some gems may then be discovered, such as the voluptuous Traumgesicht. This may well be placed on a par with the tone poems of Sibelius, Richard Strauss or Alexander Scriabin.

Helsingin Sanomat 17.8.

The symphonic poem Traumgesicht and the expansive orchestral song Marjatta demonstrate Melartin’s propensity for impressionism and orchestral experiment. The fantastical dream poem and Marjatta, a sort of sister work to Luonnotar, are magnificent works.

Rondo 8/2016 Erkki Melartin: Traumgesicht, Marjatta, Music from the ballet The Blue Pearl

CD: Finnish RSO/Hannu Lintu, sol. Soile Isokoski, soprano (Ondine 1283-2)

Out of the ordinary Plunging boldly into his jungle of notes, Nieminen knows how to serve up out-of-the-ordinary flavours for the listener not jelled on the tonal candies of art music.

Keskisuomalainen 11.8.

Concert of chamber works by Kai Nieminen

Erkki Palola, violin and viola, Tuomas Mali, piano, 9.8.2016 Jyväskylä, Finland Ilta (Evening) with Key Ensemble and ERI Dance Theatre

Moving Englund’s fourth Einar Englund’s Symphony No. 4 for strings and percussion is a sort of homage to Shostakovich. Deeply moving, it operates between introverted gloominess and extroverted optimism tinged with nostalgia.

Hufvudstadsbladet 30.7.

Einar Englund: Symphony No. 4

Ostrobothnian CO/Sakari Oramo, 27.7.2016 Korsholm, Finland

Aristocratic choral music The weightiest work on the disc is the six-part Missa a cappella by Kokkonen, aristocratic liturgical music in homophonic style in which the rich Gloria and Credo are sung with a strong, compelling pulse while the idiom of the Sanctus and Agnus Dei is more meditative and complex.

Hufvudstadsbladet 15.6.

Joonas Kokkonen: Missa a cappella

CD: Cantores Minores/Hannu Norjanen (Fuga 9405)

Photo: Matti Kivekäs

“Dropwaves” is a piano sonata disguised as pro­ grammatic water music: drops turn into waves, which then become currents. It is obvious here that Staern knows his music history. There is a capriciousness taken from Cage´s music of the 40´s (first movement), an extreme proximity to Messiaen (second movement) and flowing water as with Liszt and Debussy (third movement). The young David Huang was simply phenomenal at the piano. This is sure to become a repertoire piece.

Svenska Dagbladet 1.7.

In “Air-Spiral-Light” the sonorities span over an ex­tremely broad spectrum, from the airiest sounds made by glass tuned to different pitches and a bullroarer, to African djembe drums and in-between a solo guitar that in itself comprises flageolets and the pluckiest of sounds… Staern invites his audience to join in with the happening and share his joy of discovery in the endless possibilities of music.

Helsingborgs Dagblad 1.7.

Kellermann and the likewise brilliant ensemble, led by Christian Karlsen, have invited us to embark on a dangerous ride… passages where swinging, rhythmical music (in which Stravinsky flits by in something resembling frenetic jazz) runs amok, gets derailed and crash-lands in the most wonderful ways.

Dagens Nyheter 4.7.

Benjamin Staern: Dropwaves, Air-Spiral-Light

World premieres: David Huang, piano, Jacob Kellermann, guitar, Camilla Hoitenga, flute, Karin Dornbusch, clarinet, Magdalena Meitzner, percussion, Lendvai String Trio, Arne Bock, electronics, cond. Christian Karlsen, 29.6. and 1.7.2016 Båstad Chamber Music Festival, Sweden

Thrilling climax

The sound of the a cappella choir shimmers and vibrates almost à la Rautavaara. Heiniö cleverly applies his readily-accessible and directly communicative yet never banal or predictable style as befits the situation…the music evokes the most varied of visual associations.

Hufvudstadsbladet 17.8.

The undisputed climax of the concert was the premiere performance of Heiniö’s Three Morning Songs. In the closing movement of this profound, feverishly galloping cycle, baritone Haapaniemi and pianist Ville Matvejeff flashed their virtuosic skills and swept the audience along.

Turun Sanomat 17.8.

Mikko Heiniö: Three Morning Songs

CD: Key Ensemble/Teemu Honkanen, Erkki Lahesmaa, cello, Henna Jämsä, clarinet (Fuga 9409)

3/2016

Benjamin Staern in Båstad

Impressive Ilta by Mikko Heiniö

Ilta (Evening) is so far the choir’s most impressive commission… Heiniö plumbs various aspects of evening in dream-like fashion: longing for love and death, comforting and threatening darkness intermingle.

The work is also an interesting multi-lingual anthology of evening poetry from Aleksis Kivi to Baudelaire.

RondoClassic 6/2016 Mikko Heiniö: Ilta (Evening)

H i ghl i ghts

Jacob Kellermann playing Air-Spiral-Light

World premiere: Sampo Haapaniemi, baritone, Ville Matvejeff, piano, 12.8. 2016 Turku, Finland (Turku Music Festival)

Photo: Niklas Gustavsson

Broström’s high-flying Sputnik

Repertoire tips

Autumnal works HUGO ALFVÉN En Skärgårdssägen (A Legend from the Skerries) (1904) Dur: 16’ 3344-4231-12-2hp-str

According to Alfvén this is a lyrical symphonic tone poem depicting the outskirts of the archipelago in a nocturnal autumn atmosphere, in the glittering moonlight, in a heaving storm, in dreamy tranquillity and in a struggle for life – a portrayal that at the same time lets the nature images throughout offer an analogue to the dark happiness of human suffering.

ANDREAS HALLÉN Im Herbst/Om hösten (In Autumn) (1895) Dur: 12’ 2022-2000-10-str

Two highly romantic miniature tone paint­ ings. The first ‘Elfentanz in Mondes­zauber’ is a light, airy, glowing and atmospheric piece, while the second, ‘Traumbilder in Dämmerungsschein’, has a more serious Nordic National-Romantic and passionate character.

MIKKO HEINIÖ Syyskesän laulu (Late Summer Song) (2008) Dur: 17’ baritone (or bass) and orchestra: 2222-2200-01-str Text: Lassi Nummi (Finnish)

Heiniö combines lyrical expression with beautiful, elastic orchestration and Nummi’s tender texts. The sensitive, impressionistic mood is airy and heedful throughout. This is music with subtle gestures, and everything in the score is carefully thought-out and weighty. Available also for voice and piano.

LARS-ERIK LARSSON Intimate Miniatures (Late Autumn Leaves) (1938) Dur: 15’ string quartet

Larsson´s charming, neoclassical Intimate Miniatures is written in exquisite autumnal colours and was originally composed to be interspersed with the reading of poems from Ola Hansson´s “Late Autumn Leaves”. The four pieces start with a romantic and melancholy Adagio, followed by a dance-like Allegro moderato in triple time, a lyrical and melodious Andante sostenuto, concluding with a rhythmical Allegro in quintuple time.

Photo: Martina Holmberg

Tre Donne: Jeanette Köhn, Miriam Treichl and Katija Dragojevic.

MATS LARSSON GOTHE The Autumn Diary (2013-14) Dur: 21’ 2222-2200-01-str

In Larsson Gothe’s musical diary some days are serene and harmonious, while others are dramatic and chaotic. There are sleepless nights where the tempo slows down and the music becomes contemplative. A beautiful Lamento towards the end of the work, lends peace of mind, if only for a short while. The work ends with “extremely expressive” and agitated high strings pitted against dark bassoons and a dry, rumbling timpani.

LEEVI MADETOJA Syksy/Höst (Autumn) (1930/orch 1940) Dur: 17’ Song cycle for high voice and orchestra: 2232-3331-11-hp-str Text: L. Onerva (Finnish/Swedish)

Madetoja’s dark and atmospheric cycle consists of five songs to texts by L. Onerva, a famous poet and Madetoja’s wife. The scale of the songs ranges from potent, brooding nature scenes to sensitive, minimalistic shades. Originally composed for voice and piano.

KAI NIEMINEN In Mirrors of Time... (Through Colours of Autumn) (2000) Dur: 14’ 2221-1100-11-hp-str

The timbral world of this work is delicate, fragile and airy. The work opens with a meditative stringsharp dialogue. The winds occasionally add deeper hues, but the mood is softly opaque throughout. Out of the shimmering texture rises a harp, which occupies an important role in the work.

PEHR HENRIK NORDGREN Autumnal Concerto (1974) Dur: 30’

traditional Japanese instruments (shakuhachi, shamisen, koto, jushichigen) and orchestra: 3333-3221-06-hp-pf.cel-str

The years he spent in Japan as a student were a momentous experience for Nordgren and their impact is reflected in this work.

A magnificent, intensive blend of Western and Japanese sounds, the Concerto is one of the best examples of his unorthodox, idiosyncratic style.

HANNU POHJANNORO rooms of autumn/syksyn huoneet (1997) Dur: 11’ string quartet

Pohjannoro began writing the quartet in August 1996, and something of the autumn light and wind seems to have stuck to the music. Its

nucleus consists of five short, succinct episodes surrounded by preludes and interludes – approaches and shifts – and finally a drawing away, a coda. The work is an enchanting dialogue of movement and purpose, counterpoint.

EINOJUHANI RAUTAVAARA Autumn Gardens (1999) Dur: 28’ 2222/2000/11/str

As Robert Layton wrote: “At times through the foliage one almost catches, as it were, a glimpse of a Sibelian landscape.” The name of this beautiful, grandiose work is from the opera The House of the Sun: ‘like a butterfly in a dark autumn garden’, and the musical motif is heard as the theme in the first movement.

SVEN-DAVID SANDSTRÖM

Étude No. 4 as in E minor (1987)

Dur: 18’

six-part divisi a cappella choir Text: Tobias Berggren (Swedish)

Sandström’s setting of Berggren’s poem about late summer’s lushness before the impending collapse, is painted in romantic colours. He follows sensitively the fundamental mood of the melancholic and sensual poem with a feeling for all its nuances and changes. The work has a well-nigh orchestral texture with its up to 12 individual choral parts and soloist features.

WILHELM STENHAMMAR Late Summer Nights (1914) Dur: 17’ piano solo

A late-romantic piano suite that with a tinge of sadness evokes images of summer drawing to a close. The first piece is introspective and pensive, the second gives a presentiment of the coming autumn storms, the third is more reflective and impressionistic, in the fourth the tones gush forth like water after a downpour, while the last piece, Poco Presto, has a folksy character.

VELJO TORMIS Autumn Landscapes / Sügismaastikud (orch. 2009) Dur: 6’ str

This is a part of the Reminiscentiae suite for string orchestra – originally written for choir. Its five movements can be played separately or in any order and they include Spring Sketches (xyl/str), Summer Pictures (2perc/str), Winter Patterns (trp in Bb/ str) and St. John’s Day Songs (str). An instantly accessible, sonorous piece with velvety strings in the opening movement.

Sandström’s much needed opera Sandström´s music eschews spectacular outbursts by hysterical prima donnas, but touches on the grief of divas with wounded souls. With an ensemble put together with sure instinct, it quivers with aching beauty and melodic melancholy, tenderness, and fragility. One has a presentiment of the women´s anxiety and agitated alarm in the swift fluctuations of the music. The group ‘Tre Donne’ are devoted and loyal to their roles.

Svenska Dagbladet 30.8.

The shiftings between cruelty and beauty have, it seems, become something of a trademark for Sandström, but here the contrasts have been set to music with unusually delicate nuances …The Performance is a much needed opera about vulnerability.

Dagens Nyheter 30.8.

Sven-David Sandström: Föreställningen (The Performance) World premiere: Tre Donne (Jeanette Köhn, soprano, Katija Dragojevic, Miriam Treichl, mezzo-sopranos), musicians from the Royal Opera Orchestra/Mattias Böhm, 28.8.2016, Stockholm, Sweden

H i ghl i ghts

3/2016

new p u b li c a ti o ns s c o r es

JONAS VALFRIDSSON

In Killing Fields Sweet Butterfly Ascend

TOBIAS BROSTRÖM

for orchestra

GE 12258 (score), GE 12881 (study score)

La Danse

for orchestra

tuto r s CSABA SZILVAY

Colourstrings Cello ABC: Book G

GE 12039 (score), GE 12980 (study score)

The focus is on scales and modes, positions and intonation, parallel and relative keys, whole tone scale, chromatic scale, twelve-tone technique and distance scales.

Hungarian Dance No. 6 (J. Brahms/arr: T. Broström)

for trumpet, banjo, accordion, piano and string orchestra GE 12956 (score)

Sputnik

FG 979-0-55009-483-3

version for piccolo trumpet, piano and string orchestra (2 flutes ad lib)

Cello ABC – Daily Cello Technique

These exercises complement the Cello ABC method but can also be used independently.

GE 12951 (score), GE 12953 (study score)

FG 979-0-55011-277-3

new C D s ERIK BERGMAN

Works for male choir

Bergmania Ensemble, Sibelius Academy Vocal Ensemble/Matti Hyökki

C H OR A L SUSANNA LINDMARK

Song of Praise for SSAA choir and cello Text: The composer (Eng) GE 12962

CHRISTIAN ENGQUIST

Alba ABCD 392 (3CD)

For the Worried and Weak

for mixed choir a cappella Text: The composer (Eng) GE 12971

BENGT HAMBRAEUS

Piano Concerto

SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg/ Israel Yinon, sol. Ortwin Stürmer NEOS 11311

JOONAS KOKKONEN

KATZENJAMMER/ ARR: HENRIK DAHLGREN

God’s Great Dust Storm

Text: The composer (Eng) for mixed choir, tambourine and bass drum GE 12961 for SSAA choir, tambourine and bass drum GE 13019

C H A M B E R & IN S T R U M E N TA L KALEVI AHO

Partita

for cello and guitar FG 979-0-55011-293-3 (score)

A new work from Aho written and premiered in 2016.

EINAR ENGLUND

String Quartet

FG 979-0-55011-292-6 (score), FG 979-0-55011-291-9 (parts)

TOMMIE HAGLUND

Miraggio

for soprano (vocalise), violin, cello and piano GE 12804 (score and parts)

INGVAR LIDHOLM

Klavierstück 1949

for piano solo

Missa a cappella

EINOJUHANI RAUTAVAAVA

JEAN SIBELIUS

Finlandia

Credo

for mixed choir A new edition with texts both in Finnish and Swedish

Cantores Minores/ Hannu Norjanen Fuga 9405

FG 979-0-55011-290-2

ERKKI MELARTIN

Traumgesicht, Marjatta, Music from the ballet The Blue Pearl

JEAN SIBELIUS/ ARR: TIMO LEHTOVAARA

Five Christmas Songs / Fem Julsånger Op. 1

Finnish RSO/Hannu Lintu, sol. Soile Isokoski

for mixed choir

FG 979-0-55011-288-9 (English text) FG 979-0-55011-287-2 (Swedish text)

Ondine 1283-2

HERMAN RECHBERGER

Assahra

Trio Fratres (Toni Hämäläinen, Heikki Jokiaho, Raimo Vertainen, accordions) Fuga 9408 ”Live at Kuhmo Chamber Music”

NINA ÅKERBLOM NIELSEN

Missa nova Sofiae

for soloist, mixed choir, flute, double bass, piano, percussion ad lib.

Text in Latin GE 12987–12991

GE 13031

KIRMO LINTINEN

C.I.D.

for wind quintet FG 979-0-55011-297-1 (score), FG 979-0-55011-296-4 (parts)

ALBERT SCHNELZER

Aqua Songs

for piano quintet Composed for the celebration of HM King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden’s 70th birthday GE 12886 (score and parts), GE 12887 (study score)

JENNAH VAINIO

Odin’s Beard

for wind quintet FG 979-0-55011-295-7 (score), FG 979-0-55011-294-0 (parts)

For further information about our works or representatives worldwide check our web sites or contact us at:

H i ghl i ghts

3/2012

Gehrmans Musikförlag AB Box 42026, SE-126 12 Stockholm, Sweden Tel. +46 8 610 06 00 • Fax +46 8 610 06 27 www.gehrmans.se • info@gehrmans.se News: news.gehrmans.se • Hire: hire@gehrmans.se Web shop: www.gehrmans.se Sales: sales@gehrmans.se

Fennica Gehrman Oy Ab PO Box 158, FI-00121 Helsinki, Finland Tel. +358 10 3871 220 • Fax +358 10 3871 221 www.fennicagehrman.fi • info@fennicagehrman.fi Hire: hire@fennicagehrman.fi Web shop: www.fennicagehrman.fi Sales: kvtilaus@kirjavalitys.fi (dealers)