The Snowshoed Sibelius

[Mirror Image]

The Wood Nymph is phenomenal. I listened to it before noticing the opus, I really would've thought it was composed in a later period. Definitely to my ears one of Sibelius' best works.

Great to hear, Greg! Yes, The Wood-Nymph is an amazing work. The other works on that BIS recording you bought are quite nice as well, so please give them a listen as well.

[Mirror Image]

I have the Collins cycle on CD. I think that these performances were highly rated when there was limited competition. Having said that, as a cycle, I rather enjoy the performances but must listen to them again.

Given all the choices we have now for Sibelius symphony cycles, it's no wonder this one has slipped through the cracks for me for so long.

[Madiel]

Time to regroup some past postings about works:

I really don't think we were in much danger of losing them.

[Mirror Image]

I really don't think we were in much danger of losing them.

No, but for my own purposes, it's nice to have them together.

[Ken B]

Given all the choices we have now for Sibelius symphony cycles, it's no wonder this one has slipped through the cracks for me for so long.

And here I think of John as the go-to guy on Sibelius symphony cycles. Guess not ... 

[Karl Henning]

The Sibelius set even John won't listen to! 

[Mirror Image]

 

The recorded sound just has me a bit frightened. If this weren't the case, I'd be all over Collins' Sibelius like a monkey on a cupcake.

[Madiel]

As mentioned on the general listening thread, I'm listening to the Violin Concerto for the very first time.

Totally. Blown. Away.

Speaking as a person who's not always fond of concertos because they can put showmanship over musicianship... this is one of the best damn concertos I've ever heard.

[Mirror Image]

As mentioned on the general listening thread, I'm listening to the Violin Concerto for the very first time.

Totally. Blown. Away.

Speaking as a person who's not always fond of concertos because they can put showmanship over musicianship... this is one of the best damn concertos I've ever heard.

Certainly my thoughts on Sibelius' VC as well. Glad you enjoyed it. This was a work that took me some time to appreciate, but when it did, it was like an explosion in my mind. I need to go back and listen to that Kavakos/Vanska performance. Perhaps my judgement on the audio quality was a bit too harsh.

[Ken B]

The Sibelius set even John won't listen to! 

Yet.

[Mirror Image]

Kullervo, Op. 7



Op. 7 Kullervo Symphony for soprano, baritone, male voice choir and orchestra. 1. Introduction, 2. Kullervo's Youth, 3. Kullervo and his Sister, 4. Kullervo goes to War, 5. Kullervo's death; words from Kalevala. Completed in 1892; first public performance 28th April 1892, Helsinki (soloists Emmy Achté and Abraham Ojanperä, Orchestra of the Helsinki Orchestra Society under Jean Sibelius). Arrangement for baritone and piano of part of the music (Kullervo's Lament) 1893, revised version 1917-18. Arrangement for baritone and orchestra of part of the music (Kullervo's Lament) 1957; first performance on 14th June 1957 in Helsinki (Kim Borg, the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra under Jussi Jalas).

Jean Sibelius started to think up ideas for Kullervo in Vienna in the spring of 1891, in his student flat at the corner of Wiedner Haupstrasse 36 and Waaggasse 1.

He was studying under Robert Fuchs and Carl Goldmark, but his teachers were not enthusiastic about his first attempts at orchestral works. Goldmark thought that Sibelius's first work was badly orchestrated. According to Fuchs the ideas he produced after this were also "barbaric and raw". This made the composer's Finnish blood boil. So, let's be barbarians!

Sibelius became absorbed in Kalevala and found in it exciting rhythms and fascinating variations on themes – materials for a new kind of music. Sibelius himself had mentioned "a new, Finnish type of song", referring to his setting of Runeberg's poem Drömmen. From now on, his style would include "that melodious, strangely melancholic monotony which is in all Finnish melodies".

On 3rd February 1891, on the first floor at Waaggasse, Sibelius was burning the sketches which he had written in a more German style and "laughing scornfully". He was starting to work on a symphony, and as late as the beginning of April he was writing a finale which "begins with a recitative which actually takes an upward curve into the last movement: variations on a theme handled in the Finnish manner, a free treatment". However, in April he heard Richter conduct Beethoven's ninth symphony and felt "so tiny, so tiny". The symphony came to nothing.

Sibelius was not discouraged. He started to write a new "symphony" - as he called the work to begin with and often even later. Sibelius took the subject matter from the Kullervo saga in Kalevala. In this a young man seduces a woman without knowing that she is his long-lost sister. Both end up committing suicide.

In a letter to Aino, Sibelius wrote that he had initially discarded at least 50 themes. He had obviously paid attention to the advice of his teacher, Goldmark, about the need to craft his themes carefully. Finally he came up with a theme that he was satisfied with. A prototype of the main theme of the first movement of Kullervo had taken shape. The theme can be found the letter Janne sent to Aino on 18th April 1891, even if it is still in F major.


"I am trying to find out what my symphony is all about. It is so different from everything that I have written so far," Sibelius wrote concerning his thematic sequence. Two days later Sibelius wrote to Aino that Fuchs had been enthusiastic about the new Kullervo theme.

Sibelius worked on the first movement for a long time. Apparently he continued to prepare it in the summer of 1891, first on his return from Vienna to Finland and then after he settled down to compose in Loviisa during the autumn. Right at the end of the year Sibelius acquainted himself with the art of Larin Paraske, a Finnish singer of runes, in Porvoo. Yrjö Hirn later recollected the meeting.

"I was travelling with Jean Sibelius from Loviisa via Porvoo to Hämeenlinna. At that time my travelling companion, who was five years my senior, was developing plans that would result in the symphonic poem Kullervo, which was completed and performed the following year. He was very eager to hear what Karelian runes sounded like when they were sung by a genuine Karelian singer, and I was of course glad to be able to witness this encounter between the new and the old. I dare not speculate what it meant for the compositions the master based on Kalevala, the fact that he could listen to Paraske just then. I just remember how he followed the song attentively and wrote down the melody and the rhythms."

In his old age, Sibelius told his son-in-law Jussi Snellman that he had been a good deal more sceptical.

"Kullervo had been composed in the summer and autumn of 1891. When it was completed I went with Hirn to Porvoo to see Paraske. There was not much snow on the ground but it was already very cold. At the time I had no idea what a celebrity was sitting in front of me. In her singing I mainly paid attention to how such a 'rune singer' uses Finnish: 'murehiaa-aa-aa', 'musta lintuu-uu-uu', in other words, especially the way they prolong and stress the last syllables of a word. To my ears the stress that Paraske used sounded very strange, and I had no idea that I was dealing with such a great master, since I did not find her such an extraordinary rune singer. In 'Kullervo' I had used a natural stressing of syllables. Later I followed Paraske's way in poems with the Kalevala metre, e.g. in 'Väinämöisen venematka' (Väinämöinen's Boat-ride)."

Sibelius's memory was faulty when he claimed that Kullervo had been completed before the meeting with Paraske. He returned to Loviisa for Christmas, continued to compose Kullervo and wrote down the theme for the second movement in a tender love letter that he sent to Aino on 29th December 1891.

From the end of January 1892 the composing continued in Helsinki, at the Kaivopuisto bathing establishment. At the beginning of March Sibelius decided that the choir should be a male choir. He took the view that the scene in the third movement depicting sexual intercourse - though shown by purely musical means – would embarrass female singers. "You, my dear, will understand," Sibelius wrote to his fiancée.

The rehearsals started at the beginning of April. Juho Ranta, who sang in the choir, recollected the events in 1933.

"There were not that many general rehearsals. All I can remember is that the 'official' language of the orchestra was German, most of the musicians being foreigners. Although my skills in German are very modest, I was proud when after hearing: 'Bitte, noch einmal vom Buchstab X', I could explain to my comrades, who only spoke their own language, that we should now repeat from some point or another."

The soloist Emmy Achté later wrote to her daughter that the orchestral rehearsals had been awkward.

"Yes, I will never forget the first rehearsal with the orchestra, when after my first recitative the members of the orchestra started laughing uncontrollably, splitting their sides."

28. The first public performance was on April 28th 1892 with Emmy Achté and Abraham Ojanperä as the soloists. The composer's hands were shaking and he looked pale, but the energy of the performance immediately gripped a section of the audience. "It was like a volcanic eruption," Axel Törnudd recollected. "Most of the listeners considered it complete chaos."

It was not until Robert Kajanus presented a wreath to Sibelius that the applause grew louder. This did not prevent the columnist Leonard Salin (under the pseudonym Boulot in Hufvudstadsbladet) from sneering that he had no idea at what point the orchestra stopped tuning up and the music began.

There was an element of language politics in all this. It was clear to the "Fennomans" that Sibelius had now joined their ranks. For their part, the "Svecomans" were disappointed in Sibelius, whose mother tongue was Swedish.

The Finnish-speaking composer and critic Oskar Merikanto wrote of his uncertainty about the work (in Päivälehti, 29th April). He conceded, however, that the composer had "taken a long step forward with this work and, at the same time, taken Finnish art towards a highly promising future." He continued: "The whole composition is, due to its Finnish content, the most impressive and powerful work ever to come from a Finnish pen."

The Swedish-speaking critic Karl Flodin praised the work with reservations: "Jean Sibelius has a tune of his own, it is a gift originating from great abilities, and with it he writes his own, our own music." According to Flodin Kullervo's modulations, rhythms and melodies had their origin in Finnish folk songs. Flodin also predicted that Kullervo would be the end of a road. "If Sibelius wanted to write a new symphonic poem, for instance a depiction of Lemminkäinen, he would have to find a completely new perspective in order not to repeat what he already has said in Kullervo."

Sibelius conducted his work only a few times. The last performances were in 1893, when the critics surprised him with a broadside of scathing criticism. Even Merikanto now considered the orchestral parts too long drawn out.

The composer was shocked and he never conducted the work again – nor did he let anyone else conduct the entire work during his lifetime. One reason that the work was not performed may have had to do with the score getting lost. But when Sibelius did get the score back he had already grown out of the style of the work. "Kullervo was a treasure house," he said in his old age, but he thought that the house had been emptied long ago.

Today it is possible to take a different view of the work. In the hands of first-class modern conductors, the clumsy aspects convey an exciting roughness. In the 1990s there was a veritable flood of Kullervo recordings, and at the beginning of the 21st century the work continues to be a popular item for Finnish orchestras to take abroad.

Kullervo is at the same time a masterpiece and a baggy monster of a work, bursting at the seams. It is the King Kong of orchestral composition. Its brutality and massive size command fear and respect, yet it is at heart a romantic work.

After the completion of Kullervo Sibelius could proceed in only one direction: towards greater concentration and a more consistent symphonic form. The critic Karl Flodin was right. Kullervo was not the start of a road; it was the end. Never again would Sibelius create anything as brazenly megalomaniac.

[Article taken from Sibelius.fi]

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What does everyone think of the symphony Kullervo? I've loved it since I first heard it six years ago. The first performance I heard was Paavo Jarvi's with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic on Virgin Classics. Still a killer performance in my view. Anyway, I think these first stabs at the symphonic genre (along with Lemminkainen Suite) show a brilliant musical mind trying to find his footing, but I think he was wholly successful. My current favorite Kullervo performances are Vanska/Lahti SO and Segerstam/Helsinki PO. What about you guys?

[Madiel]

I need to go back and listen to that Kavakos/Vanska performance. Perhaps my judgement on the audio quality was a bit too harsh.

Well, the audio quality is... interesting. I'm only listening through my computer speakers which are hardly the best, but it's quite a reverberant sound.

I don't know that that's the version I'm going to buy, mainly because of the coupling. I don't especially want Sibelius' first thoughts, he's one composer whose revision process I take seriously.

Now excuse me, I have to go read through the thread actually paying attention to people's concerto recommendations!

[Mirror Image]

Well, the audio quality is... interesting. I'm only listening through my computer speakers which are hardly the best, but it's quite a reverberant sound.

I don't know that that's the version I'm going to buy, mainly because of the coupling. I don't especially want Sibelius' first thoughts, he's one composer whose revision process I take seriously.

Now excuse me, I have to go read through the thread actually paying attention to people's concerto recommendations!

I didn't much care for Sibelius' original version of the Violin Concerto as I think his revision condensed it down to something more cohesive. A perfect integration of violin and orchestra as I've ever heard. My own recommendations for the VC are Kuusisto/Segerstam and Hahn/Salonen. These are my top choices.

[Madiel]

My own recommendations for the VC are Kuusisto/Segerstam and Hahn/Salonen. These are my top choices.

So I have just read!

The Hahn/Salonen interests me, I will have to sample, and to be honest will have to sample the Schoenberg it comes with to see if it's something I'd listen to.

Lin/Salonen also interests me, as the reviews for that one seem to be universally positive. Paired with Nielsen.

[Mirror Image]

So I have just read!

The Hahn/Salonen interests me, I will have to sample, and to be honest will have to sample the Schoenberg it comes with to see if it's something I'd listen to.

Lin/Salonen also interests me, as the reviews for that one seem to be universally positive. Paired with Nielsen.

It's been years since I've heard that Lin/Salonen recording. Don't remember too much about it. The Nielsen coupling is a more logical one IMHO than the Schoenberg pairing on the Hahn/Salonen, but I didn't buy it for the coupling anyway.

[Madiel]

If you look back in this thread, I think you'll find that once upon a time Lin/Salonen was one of your favourites.

I'm pretty sure it was you. Although it's after midnight so my memory could be playing tricks.

[Ken B]

If you look back in this thread, I think you'll find that once upon a time Lin/Salonen was one of your favourites.

I'm pretty sure it was you. Although it's after midnight so my memory could be playing tricks.

If it was commercially issued it was John's favorite at some point.

[some guy]

It's a very curious thing for me to read all the praise for Sibelius' violin concerto.

It's the one piece by Sibelius that I just cannot stomach. There are other Sibelius pieces I don't care for much, but the violin concerto is the one I simply don't listen to any more.

I tried, many years ago when I was first learning to love Sibelius--he became one of my favorites for awhile, back when I had favorites. The chamber works, the symphonies, the opera, the theatre music, the press celebrations music. Just splendid stuff that I never lost a taste for even after I was thoroughly enamoured of things like Fluxus and electroacoustic and noise bands.

But the violin concerto? Seems very IMperfect to me and not even like it's by Sibelius, really.

I don't suppose it's possible to find out why, but it is curious. We're obviously hearing things quite quite differently. But why only the VC? We're obviously hearing the other things more or less the same way. Well, it's a puzzle, and likely to stay so. (Though I obviously want it to be solved, eh?)

[Dancing Divertimentian]

(Though I obviously want it to be solved, eh?)

I would hope so.

[Mirror Image]

If it was commercially issued it was John's favorite at some point.