FMQ - music history Articles

HUOM – Reviving orchestral music that history forgot

Whose are the voices we hear at concerts? Which stories are conveyed through art music, and which are not? Questions like this are becoming increasingly common, and now we are starting to find answers to them. The Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra is engaged in a project titled HUOM, History's Unheard Orchestral Music. The project is reviving orchestral music written by Finnish woman composers in the 19th and 20th centuries, thereby re-evaluating our cultural history, revitalising our concert institutions and fostering new collaboration between music scholars and performing musicians.

Kare Eskola

January 20, 2022

Reviews

De-marginalising repertoire, one disc at a time

"There are gems to be discovered in this repertoire, disdained by contemporaries and marginalised by history."

Kare Eskola

November 30, 2021

Reviews

Old tales, new sounds

"It will come as no surprise that Dima Slobodeniouk and his Lahti musicians give all four works committed and lively performances, and that the BIS team have captured them in vivid sound."

Martin Anderson

November 30, 2021

Features

As the canon turns – reflections on the centenary of Joonas Kokkonen

Joonas Kokkonen began his life in a small town in the 1920s and went on to become one of Finland’s most celebrated and internationally most successful composers. Today, his music is rarely performed in concert.

Pekka Hako

November 4, 2021

Columns

The geocultural politics of music historiography in Finland

"The fundamental problem of current music historiography, in Finland and elsewhere in the postcolonial civilised world, is that the preoccupation with evading all possible accusations of racism overwhelms historical investigations into how the present practices – historical narration included – are part and parcel of a political continuum where racist ideologies have been and continue to be amongst the most powerful ones."

Antti-Ville Kärjä

March 29, 2021

Features

A national symbol and music without borders – can folk music be both?

The phenomena grouped under the soubriquet of Finnish folk music include transnational cultural phenomena on the one hand and strong regional traditions on the other, and not nearly all of these are defined by where Finland’s political borders happened to be at any particular time.

Tove Djupsjöbacka

March 29, 2021

Features

The first Finnish Music Quarterly ever

The year 2020 marks the 35th anniversary of the publication of the very first issue of the Finnish Music Quarterly. We are now publishing a digital facsimile of that first issue.

FMQ

December 17, 2020

Features

A celebration of historical Finnish women who wrote music, Part 6: Sofie Lithenius

Sofie Lithenius (1847–1926) was a prolific and energetic primary school teacher and composer who played a unique role in the history of Finnish vocal music and music education.

Nuppu Koivisto-Kaasik

September 25, 2020

Features

A celebration of historical Finnish women who wrote music, Part 5: Alexandra Zheleznova-Armfelt

Composer Alexandra Zheleznova-Armfelt (1866–1933) was a member of the Finnish community in St Petersburg and created her career outside Finland itself. A review of her life and work adds to our understanding of the cosmopolitan nature of our musical history and also lends a perspective on cultural life in St Petersburg and in the Baltic Sea region in general around the turn of the 20th century.

Nuppu Koivisto-Kaasik

January 23, 2020

Reviews

Treasures revealed

"Risto-Matti Marin’s recital of unknown Finnish Romantic piano music is a triumph. The works he has chosen all arouse surprised respect – who knew? – and he plays them with unhesitating conviction."

Martin Anderson

December 12, 2019

Features

A celebration of historical Finnish women who wrote music, Part 4: Ida Moberg

Ida Moberg (1859–1947) wished to command ensembles that produced a large sound while also touching human emotions: Most of her output is for orchestra or choir or both. The topics of her works largely has to do with individual’s spiritual metamorphosis.

Susanna Välimäki

October 11, 2019

Features

A celebration of historical Finnish women who wrote music, Part 3: Laura Netzel

Composer Laura Netzel (1839–1927) was celebrated in her lifetime as a notable musician and philanthropist. Born in Savo in eastern Finland, she spent her life in Stockholm, where she came to be known as a prolific composer and an active member of various charities.

Nuppu Koivisto-Kaasik

August 9, 2019

Reviews

Secret Store of Symphonic Poems

"I knew Järnefelt for a fine composer and was looking forward to my encounter with this score, but I was taken aback by the sheer quality of the music."

Martin Anderson

May 10, 2019

Reviews

Elusive and Exquisite

"Jean Dubé’s virtues here are that he gives the music time to speak and that he reproduces its textures with commendable clarity, to which the recorded sound does full justice."

Martin Anderson

May 10, 2019

Features

A celebration of historical Finnish women who wrote music, Part 2: Agnes Tschetschulin

A pioneer of Finnish violin repertoire and a virtuoso of the school of Joseph Joachim – handsome epithets that apply to composer and violinist Agnes Tschetschulin (1859–1942). She was the first star student of the Helsinki Music Institute (now the Sibelius Academy) and went on to create a prominent international career.

Susanna Välimäki

May 2, 2019

Features

Technology embraces the visitor at the new Music Museum Fame

The Finnish Music Museum Fame in Helsinki will open in October 2019. Featuring art music and popular music side by side, this museum makes ample use of the latest technology to offer immersive sound universes and virtual landscapes.

Jere Jäppinen

March 31, 2019

Features

A celebration of historical Finnish women who wrote music, Part 1: Activists strive for gender equality

The history of Finnish music is unexpectedly rich in women who have written music. Nearly three dozen interesting personalities may be found in the 19th and early 20th centuries alone. The present series of articles discusses the lives and music of these women – an excellent opportunity for the reader to learn more about this largely unexplored group of Finnish classical composers. This first article serves as an introduction and also showcases a concert series given by violinist Mirka Malmi to give voice to this forgotten music.

Susanna Välimäki

February 8, 2019

Features

Western musical diplomacy in Finland during the Cold War, Part 3: Experimental music arrives in Finland

The cultural cold war between the superpowers that began after the Second World War played a major role in shaping the international arts and culture scene as we know it today. This series of articles discusses the impacts of cultural diplomacy, particularly that of the USA, on Finnish music from the days of the Cold War to the present. This third part examines how American avant-garde came to Finland in the 1960s and what impacts it had.

Tanja Tiekso

January 21, 2019

Features

There is Power in the Union - Music in the Finnish American immigrant community

The recent immigration wave into Europe has proved that where there is no common language, music and art can provide an important communication avenue between immigrants and locals. Through art, immigrants are able to express their own culture but also to give a voice even to their most harrowing experiences. Likewise, music played a pivotal role for Finnish immigrants in America in the turn of the 20th century. It enabled them to maintain their Finnish identity in the new environment and to integrate into American society.

Saijaleena Rantanen

September 6, 2018

Features

Western musical diplomacy in Finland during the Cold War, Part 2: The complexities of cultural diplomacy

The cultural cold war between the superpowers that began after the Second World War played a major role in shaping the international arts and culture scene as we know it today. This series of articles discusses the impacts of cultural diplomacy, particularly that of the USA, on Finnish music from the days of the Cold War to the present. The second part focuses on the complex and diverse network of cultural diplomacy efforts aimed at Finland by the USA in the 1950s.

Tanja Tiekso

August 31, 2018

Features

The politics of apoliticism: Erik Bergman’s composition studies in Nazi Germany

Erik Bergman (1911–2006) was a pioneer in modern composition techniques in Finland. He was awarded practically every Finnish recognition and prize that it is possible for a creative artist to receive. It is a little-known fact that for his first studies abroad he went to Nazi Germany.

Juha Torvinen

April 19, 2018

Features

Western musical diplomacy in Finland during the Cold War, Part 1: A war ends, a war begins

The cultural cold war between the superpowers that began after the Second World War played a major role in shaping the international arts and culture scene as we know it today. This series of articles discusses the impacts of cultural diplomacy, particularly that of the USA, on Finnish music from the days of the Cold War to the present. The first part focuses on the years immediately after the war. Finnish music came back to life immediately after hostilities ceased, and a new international era dawned.

Tanja Tiekso

February 15, 2018

Features

Music in illo tempore

The wars fought in the early decades of Finland’s independence cast a long, dark shadow far into the second half of the 20th century. The voice of war in works by Finnish composers speaks of victory, defeat, grief and reconciliation.

Antti Häyrynen

February 14, 2018

Reviews

Princess Cecilia - Charmingly eclectic

Väinö Raitio (1891–1945) was one of Finland’s musical modernists in the 1920s – praised but unperformed until the last couple of decades. Nowadays, his colorful orchestral works have become the focus of growing interest. This year, the Helsinki Festival started its concert programme with a one-of-a-kind performance of Raitio’s first full-length opera, Princess Cecilia (1933) – previously performed 81 years ago.

Hanna Isolammi

August 24, 2017

Features

Discords in the national melody

Independent Finland is 100 years old and has a classical music scene that is diverse, pluralist and multicultural. A century ago, the situation was very different: just as the nation was heavily polarised after the bitter Civil War, musical life was similarly divided. It is not too much of a simplification to identify two musical camps: official national neo-Romanticism and “left-wing” modernism.

Hanna Isolammi

March 14, 2017

Features

The responsibility of an artist

Jean Sibelius was a political person throughout his life, although this should be understood in the right way. He was never a member of any political party, nor did he participate in any such activities. He was politically active in a different way.

Veijo Murtomäki

January 4, 2015

Features

A blank page in the history of music

The 1930s was a time of nationalism, politics and ideology in Finnish music. Yet the period was one of such pluralism that no unified and unifying zeitgeist can be identified; instead, the parallel existence of various ideological and aesthetic trends caused even individuals to contradict themselves.

Matti Huttunen

July 6, 2013

Features

Ernst Mielck - Thrice homeless

Ernst Mielck, who died at the age of only 21, is regarded as one of the most dazzling prodigies in the history of Finnish music. He was a curious figure, an outsider who nevertheless managed to make waves before his untimely death.

Kimmo Korhonen

July 9, 2012

Features

Järnefelt in a Wagnerian light

Armas Järnefelt is today principally known for two lovely miniatures: Preludi and Berceuse. Yet he was the composer of several extensive works who introduced a new, Wagnerian voice into Finnish music.

Kimmo Korhonen

May 3, 2010

Features

When jazz and rock came to Finland (on Kjell Westö)

Kjell Westö is an award-winning author whose books have been translated into several languages. But really he would like to be a musician. His historical novels are brimming with music, describing the arrival of jazz and rock in Finland.

Aki Petteri Lehtinen

January 12, 2010

Features

Scores to settle

Finnish war films feature exquisite music. To help you get the most out of the music, here is a listener's guide to the cream of the crop — although that includes one film with no score at all.

Susanna Välimäki

January 6, 2010

Features

Librettists in tune with the times

Themes in Finnish opera gradually became more diverse and international after the first opera boom in the early 20th century, when topics were primarily national. Opera became the scene of national aspirations in the 19th century. In many countries, not least its homeland, Italy, it was a means of expressing national ideals and of stressing unity. It was as much an item in political debate as drama and literature, and sometimes even more so.

Kimmo Korhonen

January 6, 2008

Features

The national character of Soviet Karelian music

There has been little research in Finland into Karelian culture on the Russian side of the border during the Soviet era. From the 1920s to the 1950s we get a fragmented picture on the whole of cultural policy in the Soviet Union. Ever the victim of ideological change, Karelian culture was sometimes something that enriched a multicultural state, sometimes something to be denounced as unorthodox.

Pekka Suutari

June 4, 2005

Features

A hundred years of Finnish recordings

In 2001, it was a hundred years since the first Finnish records appeared on the market. Pekka Gronow, the then head of record archives at the Finnish Broadcasting Company Yle, wrote about this exciting story for FMQ.

Pekka Gronow

January 10, 2001

Features

Finnish composers inspired by folk music

Although serious music is often looked upon as a clearly defined genre of its own, it has by no means remained immune to the influence of its surroundings. Composers have from time immemorial been spicing their works with ingredients borrowed from popular and folk music, and the Finns have been no exception in this respect. Folk music really blossomed in the music of the National Romantics of the 19th century, but it was also a major source of inspiration for many of the 20th century modernists.

Kimmo Korhonen

January 6, 2000

Features

Erkki Melartin - a symphonic composer of international stature?

It is finally time for Erkki Melartin to emerge from “the shadow of Sibelius”, nearly 63 years after his death. Is Melartin a symphonic composer of international stature or merely one of those “harlots and their pimps”, as Gustav Mahler termed the “national geniuses” in music?

Osmo Tapio Räihälä

January 3, 2000

Features

Musical Progress

The following article was published in an anthology of Ernest Pingoud’s writings collectively entitled “The Progress of Art” (Taiteen edistys), edited by Kalevi Aho in 1995. The articles had been translated from German, Russian and Swedish manuscripts by Seppo Heikinheimo. The essay “Musical Progress” appeared in the Montagsblatt der St. Petersburger Zeitung (Monday supplement of the St Petersburger newspaper) on April 18, 1911.

Ernest Pingoud

February 3, 1999

Features

The road to St. Petersburg

The founding of the city of St. Petersburg in 1703 meant the birth of a new orientation, a source of innovative ideas and of growth potential for the Finns. Building materials and labour were imported for the new metropolis from neighbouring Finland right from the early stages, and many of the city's bridges and palaces rest on Finnish granite.

Antti Häyrynen

January 12, 1999

Features

Sibelius Eight. What happened to it?

During the last three decades of his life, Sibelius was locked in a desperate struggle with the forces of creation, the expectations of those around him and his own growing self-criticism. By the end, the vital question had been whittled down to: perfection or completion? Consciously or unconsciously, Sibelius plumped for perfect. Kari Kilpeläinen here traces the history of the elusive eighth symphony in the light of the documents that have been preserved. Anyone interested in reading more about the subject would do well to dig out Volume 1 of the Finnish Music Quarterly (1985), in which Erik Tawaststjerna takes a broad look at the background to ‘Sibelius 8′.

Kari Kilpeläinen

January 12, 1995

Features

Oskar Merikanto, the composer who captured the hearts of the people

When the biography of Oskar Merikanto was published in 1950, it was subtitled “A household name in Finland”. And although romanticising biographies were all the vogue at the time, the title nevertheless says much about the importance of Merikanto in moulding Finnish musical taste. In the early decades of the 20th century Oskar Merikanto, his performances and music, influenced the taste of the ordinary Finn more, even, than Sibelius.

Pekka Hako

February 4, 1993

Features

Wartime sounds

This year [1992] Finland becomes 75. Our years of independence are being celebrated with exhibitions, speeches and commemorative gold coins. The country has changed in many ways since 1917, but the period which has so far attracted most attention in the celebrations has been the war. This is not surprising. For the generation of Finns born soon after the country gained her independence, the war has been the most dramatic event of their lives. Now, nearly fifty years after armistice, veterans' organizations are playing a very active role in the independence celebrations. The music of the war years is enjoying a revival, and there are even new songs being written about the veterans and their memories.

Pekka Gronow

January 9, 1992

Features

French colouring in a Bothnian landscape – Comments on the orchestral works of Leevi Madetoja (1887–1947)

"In a small culture like Finland's, the presence of a sovereign master of his field like Sibelius is bound to have a very deep significance. At least two generations of Finnish composers completed their life's work in his enormous shadow," wrote composer Jouni Kaipainen in his article about Leevi Madetoja, published in FMQ in 1985.

Jouni Kaipainen

January 9, 1985

Features

Music in the archives

Historical research very often starts with the researcher consulting archives. Finland has a wide variety of libraries and archives with material on a wide range of subjects, including Sibelius, church music from the Middle Ages, folk music and popular music.

Matti Huttunen

January 8, 1985

Features

Tales on stage

Operas and other stage works to be performed by and for children have been written in Finland since the 1940s. A new boom began in the 1980s and is still going strong.

Antti Häyrynen

January 8, 1985

Features

Records banned

On September 26, 1972 the Finnish Broadcasting Company (Yle) lifted the ban it had imposed over the years on individual records. It also decreed that the same principles as those for other material should be observed in choosing records for radio programmes.

Pekka Gronow

January 8, 1985

Features

Once I waited for someone — the story of the Finnish Tango

Finland has taken the potato from Peru — potato in Finnish is peruna, by the way — and the tango from Argentina. Both these South American imports are cultivated in these northern latitudes perhaps even more devotedly than in their countries of origin. Pekka Gronow reports on the way in which the tango has taken root in Finland and stubbornly survived even the arrival of Elvis and The Beatles.

Pekka Gronow

January 8, 1985

Features

The Story of the Finnish Choir – Social institution and human instrument

In his article from 1987 Markku Kilpiö takes a look at Finnish choral singing.

Markku Kilpiö

January 8, 1985

Features

Tauno Marttinen - Composer of intuition and inspiration

"Tauno Marttinen's (1912-2008) image as a composer is a colourful one. His work has relied on instinct and inspiration and is rooted in mysticism. For the 'shaman of Hämeenlinna', as he has become known, music and composition are a form of meditation, a key to the mysteries of the universe," writes Juha Torvinen in his article from 2003.

Juha Torvinen

January 8, 1985

Features

Rune-singing, the musical vernacular

Runes were sung by people of all ages: children and adults, old and young, men and women. They were sung on all sorts of occasions: on working days and holidays, at play and at work, as young people got together and at dances. There were also many different ways of singing them: solo, with two people or groups alternating, together in small or large groups.

Heikki Laitinen

January 8, 1985

Features

The Big Man and the Fairy - Children's music in Finland in the 1960s and 1970s

Children’s music underwent a huge transition in Finland in the 1960s and 1970s. Composer Pekka Jalkanen witnessed and contributed to this development. In this article from 2011 he discusses the history of Finnish children's music.

Pekka Jalkanen

January 8, 1985

Features

Pioneers and Explorers – Electronic Music in Finland 1958–1998

The history of electronic music in general is yet a short one, and affords an interesting angle on the passing of time. Experiments made 40 or 50 years ago may seem to us rather primitive now, but how will the high technology of today look to those working in this field fifty years from now?

Jukka Ruohomäki

January 8, 1985

Features

Uuno Klami and the Kalevala

Musicologist and composer Erkki Salmenhaara provides an introduction to the work of the Franco-Russo-Karelian cosmopolitan who was Uuno Klami.

Erkki Salmenhaara

January 8, 1985

Features

Paavo Heininen — Composer, cosmopolitan, controversialist

Paavo Heininen got down to a serious composing career, geared from the outset towards large works, at a relatively early age. This beginning came in the late 1950s, when both dodecaphony and its historical offspring serialism were making their entry into the Finnish musical arena. The newcomers encountered stern resistance: the fact that a couple of composers had determined to use the new method in no sense meant that musical life in general was ready to welcome the fresh ideas with open arms.

Jouni Kaipainen

January 8, 1985

Features

Selim Palmgren – A Finnish cosmopolite

The composer Selim Palmgren walked a tightrope between national and international trends in music. He was part of the Finnish national music movement but tried to combine this with a more international outlook.

Kimmo Korhonen

January 8, 1985

Features

The Malmstén brothers

America had Bing Crosby, Britain Al Bowlly, France Maurice Chevalier. In the pre-war years, every country had a charming gentleman singer who entertained us on records, radio and the screen. But lucky Finland had everything twofold. We had the Malmstén brothers, Georg and Eugen, the bright singing stars of the thirties.

Pekka Gronow

January 8, 1985

Features

Aarre Merikanto - a battered genius

With the works he wrote in the 1920s Aarre Merikanto (1893-1958) together with Ernest Pingoud and Väinö Raitio, planted the seed of modernism in Finnish music. The seed germinated in spite of adverse cultural conditions at the time, but only later generations were to reap the harvest.

Harri Suilamo

January 8, 1985

Features

Musicologist and humanist Erik Tawaststjerna, the interpreter of Sibelius's inner voices

“. . . seule la métaphore est exacte ... “ (Roland Barthes) Eero Tarasti, successor to Erik Tawaststjerna as professor of music at the University of Helsinki, takes a look at the method applied by Tawaststjerna in his biography of Sibelius.

Eero Tarasti

January 8, 1985

Features

The Kalevala in Finnish music

Elias Lönnrot's Kalevala was part of a return to mythology, a desire to discover the roots of the nation's culture and history that prevailed in all the peripheral regions of Europe. In Finland the publication of the Kalevala in 1835 marked a decisive impetus towards the search for all that was inherently Finnish in practically all the arts.

Eero Tarasti

January 8, 1985