Minna Leinonen

The concerto remains a cornerstone of contemporary music. How do recent recordings reinterpret this classical genre? In this article, Jari Juhani Kallio reviews the latest concerto releases by Finnish composers.

"Minna Leinonen manages to pull off the most important requirement in writing an opera: to write music that perfectly merges with the other elements surrounding it but nevertheless retains its own voice. [- -] I would not hesitate to describe Alma! as a major breakthrough for Leinonen."

Kantele player Eija Kankaanranta constantly challenges herself as a musician and embraces the new dimensions she discovers in her instrument.

"Kujala’s new Alba recording includes an excellent and fascinating collection of works from five Finnish composers."

This year, the Musica nova Helsinki 2019 festival presented a trans-Atlantic menu. The programme plumbed deep waters and explored lovely landscapes on a sea that knows no bounds. All this begs the question: are we driftwood, or are we actively charting a course to the future?

Musica nova Helsinki, Finland’s largest contemporary music festival, takes place 1-10 February 2019. Here's FMQ's selection of the concerts and events you should not miss!

"I write music like I hear it. A composer’s voice is a blend of encounters, influences, sharing and privacy, life situations and changes in the living environment." This column is part of the series "On my music and beyond", where composers and other music makers write about their music.

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.

"Foreigners like me once had the idea that Finland was a difficult country in which to be a composer; so strong was Sibelius’s legacy and so dominant those famous names who succeeded him. But that idea now seems outdated," writes Andrew Mellor in his column on the Day of Finnish Music.

In 2016 women are still under-represented in classical concert repertoire, never mind the canon. At contemporary music concerts, however, women appear as composers with increasing frequency. How should we address the issue of a composer’s (female) gender in this day and age? Are we really still talking about this, in Finland?