‘Finlandia’: A Festival of Finnish Music
Jean SIBELIUS (1865-1957)
Finlandia, Op 26 (1899) [8:26]
Suite for Violin and String Orchestra, Op 117 (1929) [6:40]
Einojuhani RAUTAVAARA (1928-2016)
Cantus arcticus, Concerto for Birds and Orchestra, Op 61 (1972) [16:55]
Väinö RAITIO (1891-1945)
Joutsenet (1919) [7:43]
Einar ENGLUND (1916-1999)
Valkoinen peura Suite (1952) [13:11]
Felix KROHN (1898-1963)
Odalisque, arranged by Leo Funtek (1924) [6:01]
Uuno KLAMI (1900-1961)
Pyöräilijä, Rondo for Orchestra (1946) [6:43]
Anonymous
Porilaisten marssi (arr. Robert Kajanus) [2:42]
Fredrik PACIUS (1809-1891)
Maamme 1848, arr. Robert Kajanus) [2:14]
Dong-Suk Kang (violin), Lahti Symphony Orchestra/Osmo Vänskä
rec. 6-11 April 1992, Church of the Cross, Lahti, Finland
BIS BIS-CD-575 [73:47]
This album is not the retread of usual repertoire it might appear at first glance. To demonstrate this, I will start with less-familiar names and proceed in increasing order of recognition. Finnish composer Väinö Raitio owed a greater debt to Scriabin than Sibelius, easily discernable in his tone poems Fantasia estatica, Fantasia poetica, and the fantastically named Moonlight on Jupiter. Joutsenet, or “The Swans,” is something of a blend of the two influences, if one can imagine a Scriabin-Sibelius hybrid. It moves in an arch form from fragmentary beginnings to an ecstatic climax before subsiding. Rising and falling passages like heaving ocean swells mark its journey to high points. There is only one competing recording, on an Ondine disc with Jukka-Pekka Saraste leading the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra (ODE 790-2). Saraste is more hard-driven than Vänskä, who allows the music a more natural pace. The BIS sound is also clearer. To sample Raitio’s salon-like conservative side, another Ondine recording captures his later works for small orchestra (ODE 975-2) (review and review).
Einar Englund was another Finnish composer outside of the Sibelian national-romantic mold. His reputation rests on the first two of his seven symphonies, the “War” and “Blackbird” symphonies, respectively. Englund also composed music for twenty films. One of these was Valkoinen peura or “The White Reindeer.” This suite from the film score has five brief movements outlining the plot: in far northern Lapland, a young girl transforms into a white reindeer in moonlight via sorcery. Eventually she embraces this unwanted power to destructive ends. Her double life as wife and sorceress is discovered when the white reindeer is shot and killed. Englund based his film score on the yoik, traditional vocal music of the region’s Sámi people. Yoiks emphasize brief, oft-repeated but variable melodic calls strung together to create ever-shifting combinations. The result is hypnotic at slow tempos and rhythmically bracing in quick ones. Vänskä leads an assured reading of this extremely evocative score. Marked as a world premiere recording on this disc, to my knowledge no competing recording exists.
Uuno Klami’s best-known work is his Kalevala Suite, a sort of Finnish Rite of Spring. Klami’s kaleidoscopic Revontulet, “Northern Lights,” for orchestra also deserves attention. Pyöräilijä or “The Cyclist,” a rondo for orchestra, on the other hand, shows Klami’s less serious side. Yet however tongue-in-cheek the concept, Klami’s technical skill and sheer instrumental polish are also on display. After a suspenseful opening, Klami presents every conceivable musical metaphor for pedaling a bicycle. These include single notes repeating faster and faster as the titular cyclist gets up to speed, bursts of alternating back-and-forth notes for bouts of pedaling, and circular melodic figures that loop back on themselves like the revolutions of the wheels. Atop this perpetual motion background, jaunty tunes come and go, revealing Klami’s affinity for the French composers of Les Six – the “group of six” that was Milhaud, Poulenc, Honegger, Auric, Tailleferre, and Durey in 1920s Paris. Pyöräilijä is pure musical pleasure. John France once pined in a MusicWeb review to hear this piece – here it is in its world premiere recording. Enjoy!
Rautavaara’s Cantus Arcticus is something of a modern classic, at least for listeners who know their Scandinavian music. Recorded birdcalls combine with atmospheric music to create a remarkably successful whole. This recording faces competition from Ondine and Naxos. Leif Segerstam leads the Helsinki Philharmonic on Ondine ODE 1041-2, Max Pommer conducts the Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra on Ondine 747-2, and Hannu Lintu leads the Royal Scottish National Orchestra on Naxos 8.554147. The Naxos recording is significantly slower than Vänskä and the engineering balances the recorded birds significantly farther “forward” than the orchestra; the result sounds like two simultaneous but unrelated events. Pommer matches Vänskä in speed but has the opposite balance problem. His birds are far in the background and difficult to hear as a result. BIS strikes the right balance so the avian and human musicians are in dialogue with each other. Segerstam’s balances are closest to Vänskä’s but the clarity and depth of the BIS recording gives it the edge.
The smaller unfamiliar works are interesting for historical as well as musical reasons. Felix Krohn conducted the Lahti Symphony Orchestra and was principal of the city’s college of music, later conservatory. These institutions shared one roof when the Lahti Concert Hall opened in 1954, Krohn’s crowning achievement. His Odalisque, originally for piano, depicts a Turkish harem dancer. Leo Funtek enhanced its exoticism by arranging it for orchestra. Funtek also arranged Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition in competition with Ravel. The Porilaisten marssi or “March of the Peoples of Pori” grew from obscure beginnings to become Finland’s “national” march, associated with the President of the Republic and the Finnish armed forces. An exuberant passage for bass drum and low brass twice interrupts its otherwise standard fare. The sheer gusto of Vänskä and the Sinfonia Lahti here brought a smile to my face. This is the first recording of its arrangement by Robert Kajanus.
Finally, there is Sibelius. The Suite for Violin and String Orchestra was among his last compositions. Each movement is a charming miniature. The first two are slender and elegant; the third is an elfin moto perpetuo. Violinist Dong-Suk Kang plays with style and grace, ably accompanied by the Sinfonia Lahti. The disc opens with a satisfyingly muscular interpretation of Finlandia that neither dawdles nor flies too quickly through this iconic score. The album closes with a tasteful orchestral arrangement by Kajanus of the Finnish national anthem, Maamme or “Our Country,” originally composed by Fredrik Pacius in 1848.
This is a gem from the back catalogue. Dedicated collectors will not need another recording of Sibelius’s Finlandia, of course, and several of the shorter works are largely filler, but the Raitio, Englund, Klami, and Rautavaara alone are worth the price of the disc. Alternatively, since Presto Music and eClassical offer this album as a 16-bit download in this, the first quarter of 2022, listeners can simply acquire the tracks they want and leave the rest. Regardless of method, I urge curious listeners to experience this music. You will enjoy it.
Christopher Little
