composing

The development of artificial intelligence has seen the introduction of several different paradigms, the latest often superseding its predecessor. In the current millennium, the improvements in the accuracy of artificial intelligence applications have rendered them usable for a range of tasks that were previously considered challenging for a machine, such as image and speech recognition.

Your friends on social media are not your friends; they are just people who are notified of updates to your account. Similarly, artificial intelligence is not intelligence; the term is a label for computational models of inductive reasoning.

“Studying under Kaija’s guidance proved to be an important experience to all of us who were learning from her – for some of us, you could say it was even life-changing.” In his essay, composer Juha T. Koskinen reflects on how having been taught by Kaija Saariaho has shaped his thinking as well as his compositional output and processes.

"I used to think of tight schedules as something that stand in the way of creativity. That the mind always needs time to ponder, weigh and analyse before the music can flow. I’ve since come to realise it’s far more complicated than that," writes film composer Panu Aaltio. This column is part of the series "On my music and beyond" where composers and other music makers write about their music.

The professional profile and operating environment of Finnish composers of classical music have become increasingly international at a rapid rate in the past three decades. Back in the day, few composers spent extensive periods of time abroad, and any trips they did take were mainly for study or for inspiration and did not necessarily involve immersion in the local music scene. This started to change in the 1990s, as the Finnish music industry began to integrate into the international music industry.

When reading the National Biography’s entry about Soili Perkiö, the living legend of Finnish music education, I begin to feel dizzy just seeing her list of publications. How is it possible for one person to achieve so much in a lifetime? The answer is simple: this pedagogue with a decades-long career at the Sibelius Academy, beloved composer, enthusiastic collector of instruments and active member of various associations, is someone who gets fired up through working with others.

Composing music is a discipline traditionally veiled in mystery. It is commonly believed that composers are born, not made, or at the very least they must discover a passionate calling for composing at an early age. Composing has also been regarded as the exclusive privilege of highly trained professional composers. Finland’s new National Core Curricula have introduced another perspective on composition. The opus1.fi databank provides teaching materials and support for the new needs of introductory teaching of composition

"The world is a mosaic of beliefs, of languages, of varied communities, and the question is not whether it is possible for them to coexist but how their coexistence could be facilitated, because we have no choice”, writes Kaija Saariaho in her column, originally published in FMQ in 2019.

Viitasaari, in central Finland 350 km north of Helsinki, is the home of the Time of Music festival. Founded in 1982, it is Finland’s oldest annual festival of contemporary music. But that is not all: it is also a continuing education event with a legendary reputation. Today, the courses given at the festival attract more top-notch foreign participants than the town can accommodate. Is this Finland’s Darmstadt – or something even better than that?

Composer, oboist and educator Riikka Talvitie shares her thoughts on the profession and training of composers now and in the future.

The Sibelius Academy is the only university-level music school in Finland. For decades, it used to be the only institution of any kind to provide tuition in composition. In 2018, composing is acquiring an important role at Finland’s music institutes, too, as in the revised curricula composing is identified as an activity that should be accessible to everyone. How can the Sibelius Academy respond to future challenges with the range of applicants becoming ever more diverse?

Composing is acquiring an important role at Finland’s music institutes and schools. In the revised curricula, composing is identified as an activity that is – or at least should be – accessible to everyone and whose positive impacts extend far beyond the realm of music itself.

Composing always has a social dimension, because composers engage in it in the context created by society. Yet composers’ views on the relationship between music and society have varied a great deal over the centuries. What do today’s composers think about their work in relation to current social and political issues?

The title would appear to be hooked up to the concept of “music and language”, or even “music as language”. As it happens, this summer I have got into several lengthy debates on this particular issue, so let’s continue in the same vein.

“The orchestra as part of society” could well be the title of an ambitious project known for short as Education work that has so far got a dozen or so Finnish orchestras bursting with enthusiasm. The most important target group is schoolchildren.