"The very titles of the works of Kaija Saariaho (b. 1952) provoke strong associations. They blind the listener ('Verblendungen'), contemplate the light arcs of the Northern lights ('Lichtbogen') or one of the moons of Jupiter ('Io'), turn their gaze from the cosmic reaches of the starry sky to the microcosm of flower petals ('Petals'), or retreat to a hidden and secret garden ('Jardin secret'). Whatever the original inspiration for any of these works, Saariaho has managed to convert it with sensitivity and skill into sensual, colourful music. And even if there are some similarities or analogies identifiable between the original inspiration and the finished work, extra-musical phenomena have always been only a starting point for Saariaho, never the object of a simplistic programme.
"There is a natural explanation for why the visual dimension is often invoked in connection with Saariaho's works. Before deciding on music as a career, she studied fine aris at the University of Arts and Design in Helsinki. She studied composition with Paavo Heininen at the Sibelius Academy from 1976 to 1981. During this time, she was active in the Korvat auki! (Ears open!) society founded in 1977 to promote contemporary music. The close professional relationship established between core members of the society was at least as important as the official activities of the society—for instance, organizing public discussions and concerts. Kaija Saariaho recalls: '...there was a circle of us with Esa-Pekka Salonen, Magnus Lindberg, Eero Hämeenniemi, Jouni Kaipainen. We were all active and interested. If someone found an interesting record, all of us would listen to it. We held seminars amongst ourselves and things like that!' The other composers are keen to point out that these intensive meetings often took place at Saariaho's home in Helsinki.
"It was largely due to the central composers in the Korvat auki! society that the 1980s became a decade of Modernism in Finnish music, with much better exposure than before given to Modernists of earlier generations too. One of the main concepts of the Korvat auki! composers was to open up windows to Europe - in the time-honoured manner of Modernists and reformers in Finland. In the case of Saariaho, this dimension became more real than for many others. As early as in summer 1980, she visited the famous summer courses of Darmstadt, and when she had completed her studies, she went to study with Brian Ferneyhough and Klaus Huber at the Freiburg Musikhochschule in 1981-82, receiving her diploma in 1983.
"Since 1982, Saariaho has lived permanently in Paris, a stone's throw away from IRCAM, the well-known contemporary music research centre where she works regularly. Despite her emigration and internationalization, Saariaho has maintained close ties to Finnish musical circles: various Finnish institutions have commissioned works from her, she has had composition concerts in Finland, and in the academic year 1997-98 she was guest Professor of Composition at the Sibelius Academy.
"In her early period in the late 1970s, Saariaho wrote several lyrical, delicate and melodically expressive vocal works. Her focus soon moved from melody to rich tonal colour and harmony, two mutually complementary elements that are closely related to one another. From the early 1980s onwards, Saariaho's music has been characterized by sound surfaces rich in detail, often hovering between pure tones and noise; delicately lyrical, evocative moods; and processes of change unfolding in slow, organic growth and evolution. There is no traditional harmonic structure, counterpoint or pulsating rhythm in works from this period.
"Towards the end of the 1980s, Saariaho's works began to acquire a more definite profile as the dream-like slowness of the earlier works began to subside. In the 1990s, her trend towards a more powerful mode of expression and more abrupt shifts has strengthened, and even melody has reappeared as a significant element in certain works. However, rich tonal colour and meticulously planned details remain important.
"In painting her original and individual landscapes in sound, Saariaho has often used state-of-the-art technology, for instance tape music, live electronics or computer assistance. Modern technology is often seen as the antithesis of delicate lyricism, but Saariaho's works demonstrate that this need not be the case. Saariaho has also worked with many top musicians of our time; for instance, her string quartet 'Nymphea' (1987) was written for the Kronos Quartet, while the orchestral works 'Du cristal' (1990) and '...O la fumée' (1990) were written for Esa-Pekka Salonen, the violin concerto 'Graal thédtre' (1994) for Gidon Kremer and the song cycle 'Château de I'âme' (1996) for soprano Dawn Upshaw.
"Saariaho's output includes orchestral, chamber, solo and vocal music. Often there is a tape involved. Saariaho has also written several works that have a dramatic or cross-discipline element, including the radiophonic work 'Stilleben' (1988), the dance work 'Maa' (Earth, 1991) commissioned by the Finnish National Ballet and choreographed by Carolyn Carlson, and various multimedia and film music projects. Her most extensive project to date is an opera commissioned by the Salzburg Festival for 2001, based on the real-life history of a 12th-century troubadour, Jaugre Rudel.
"'Verblendungen' ('Dazzlements'), commissioned by the Finnish Broadcasting Company (1982-84), was Saariaho's first extensive work after finishing her studies, a sort of transition ritual in becoming a full-blown artist. Like many of Saariaho's works, it found its origin in a visual idea, a thick brush-stroke thinning out gradually. In the music, this is reflected in the overall form, an enormous diminuendo beginning in an opening Big Bang and continuing throughout the work. In this sense, Verblendungen is a fine example of the slow processes of change typical of Saariaho's music in the early 1980s.
"'Verblendungen' is written for a 35-member orchestra, smaller than a normal symphony orchestra, and a tape prepared by Saariaho herself at the GRM Studio in Paris. The tape is based on two sounds played on a violin, a bowed sforzato and a pizzicato. This was the first time that Saariaho used a pre-prepared tape with live instrumentalists. The relationship between the musicians and the tape is an important dimension in the work, and it changes during the course of the work. At first, the orchestra is bright in sound and the tape is rough and noisy, but at the end the orchestra sounds electronic and the tape is crystal clear. However, the orchestra and tape intertwine to produce a rich and nuanced image in sound.
"Whereas 'Verblendungen' was sparked by a brush-stroke, 'Lichtbogen' for nine musicians and live electronics ('Light arcs', 1985-86), commissioned by the French Ministry of Culture, was prompted by the Northern lights. It is an extremely sensitive, finely tuned and vibrant piece that is fundamentally static yet is constantly moving and alive. Various colours and noise-like sounds shimmer and undulate in a ghostly, nebulous musical space.
"There is also a more theoretical aspect to 'Lichtbogen'. Saariaho used a computer in writing this work; this was the first time she used a computer with a purely instrumental work. The basic material consisted of harmonics played on a cello; when bow pressure is increased, the notes break up into noise. A computer analysis of this phenomenon generated the harmony and sound models that Saariaho then translated into music for the musicians to perform, complementing the sound spectrum with live electronics, i.e. electronic processing of sound in real time in concert.
"Like 'Lichtbogen', 'Io' (1986-87) for chamber orchestra, tape and live electronics was also inspired by the cosmic dimension of the starry sky. The title refers to one of the moons of Jupiter, although it is tempting to interpret it as the Italian word for 'I'. 'Io' was commissioned by IRCAM for its 10th anniversary concert at the Centre Pompidou.
"In terms of musical material, Saariaho again started off small, with an analysis of individual sound phenomena, in this case noise-like sounds produced on a double bass and a flute. She then transposed the models she had worked out onto a new level, a larger scale. 'Io' is a synthesis of musical approaches in the sense that it has a tape like 'Verblendungen' but also live electronics like 'Lichtbogen'. The tape has quite an independent role in places, and it even has a three-minute 'solo' towards the end. In terms of expression, 'Io' heralded a shift towards a more many-sided and complex texture.
"Kaija Saariaho has said that one of the crucial insights underlying the radiophonic work 'Stilleben' ('Still life', 1987-88) came to her while sitting in a train. As darkness falls, the landscape outside fades from view and the passenger's face begins to show in the window. This poetic experience points two ways with regard to 'Stilleben': firstly, to the gradual processes of change so important to many of Saariaho's works; and secondly, to the fundamental themes of 'Stilleben'. According to Saariaho, 'Stilleben' is about travelling, distance and communication between people separated from one another or from their homeland. It is easy to imagine that there is something very autobiographical in this theme for Saariaho, a Finn living in Paris and doing a lot of travelling.
"'Stilleben' was commissioned by the Finnish Broadcasting Company. It received a prize in the radiophonic works category in the Prix Italia competition in 1988, and in the following year it received the Ars Electronica prize. A 'radiophonic' work is a special kind of taped work that, as the name says, is designed to be played on radio, not in concert. Its means vary, but usually it is something between a radio play and electronic music.
"True to the nature of radiophonic works, 'Stilleben' contains a variety of material: speech in three languages (Finnish, German, French), singing, instrumental music (including extracts from 'Lichtbogen'), various concrete sounds for example from metro stations, and various types of acoustics. The texts are from letters by Franz Kafka discussing the effect of separation on communication; Saariaho has also used the poetry of Paul Eluard and artist Wassily Kandinsky. Saariaho approaches this rich and varied material more as a composer than as a storyteller. In fact, the work does not come across as a clear plot structure; rather it involves associations awakened by various situations and moods, a sort of poetry in sound that has themes and content but not precisely defined meanings.
"'Jardin secret' ('Secret garden') is a curiosity-provoking title that seems to evoke the composer's innermost thoughts. Saariaho has given this title to three works in which she has explored various parameters of music through the same basic model, using a computer. The first work of these is purely for tape (1984-85). The next to be completed was 'Jardin secret II' for harpsichord and tape. The concluding work, written for string quartet and live electronics, is 'Nymphea' (1987), sub-titled 'Jardin Secret III'.
"'Jardin secret II' is different from Saariaho's earlier compositions. It is energetic and rhythmic to the point of being chopping, The harpsichord part is restricted to a few effective basic gestures: trills, tremolos, chord ostinatos and short sharp figures. Saariaho has edited the tape using harpsichord sounds and human heavy breathing. 'Jardin Secret II' is an important work in that it helped open up a newer, more serious approach in the composer's musical thinking.
"'Petals' (1988) for cello and live electronics is a sort of associate member in the 'Jardin secret' series. The material in the work derives largely from the string quartet 'Nymphea' ('Jardin secret III'). The titles also allude to the same sort of sphere, Nymphea meaning 'waterlily'. In discussing 'Petals', we must also mention the contribution of cellist Anssi Karttunen, one of Saariaho's favourite musicians who provided the inspiration for the work and to whom it is dedicated. Saariaho has described the musical concept of 'Petals' thus: 'Petals is about contrasting elements, which here consist of pale colour on one hand and events whose kinetic energy is clearly based on rhythmic and melodic gestures on the other. These more precisely sketched shapes go through a number of changes and finally blend into the less dynamic yet intensive colour tapestry of the opening.'" (Kimmo Korhonen, tr. Jaakko Mäntyjärvi. From the liner notes.)
"There is a natural explanation for why the visual dimension is often invoked in connection with Saariaho's works. Before deciding on music as a career, she studied fine aris at the University of Arts and Design in Helsinki. She studied composition with Paavo Heininen at the Sibelius Academy from 1976 to 1981. During this time, she was active in the Korvat auki! (Ears open!) society founded in 1977 to promote contemporary music. The close professional relationship established between core members of the society was at least as important as the official activities of the society—for instance, organizing public discussions and concerts. Kaija Saariaho recalls: '...there was a circle of us with Esa-Pekka Salonen, Magnus Lindberg, Eero Hämeenniemi, Jouni Kaipainen. We were all active and interested. If someone found an interesting record, all of us would listen to it. We held seminars amongst ourselves and things like that!' The other composers are keen to point out that these intensive meetings often took place at Saariaho's home in Helsinki.
"It was largely due to the central composers in the Korvat auki! society that the 1980s became a decade of Modernism in Finnish music, with much better exposure than before given to Modernists of earlier generations too. One of the main concepts of the Korvat auki! composers was to open up windows to Europe - in the time-honoured manner of Modernists and reformers in Finland. In the case of Saariaho, this dimension became more real than for many others. As early as in summer 1980, she visited the famous summer courses of Darmstadt, and when she had completed her studies, she went to study with Brian Ferneyhough and Klaus Huber at the Freiburg Musikhochschule in 1981-82, receiving her diploma in 1983.
"Since 1982, Saariaho has lived permanently in Paris, a stone's throw away from IRCAM, the well-known contemporary music research centre where she works regularly. Despite her emigration and internationalization, Saariaho has maintained close ties to Finnish musical circles: various Finnish institutions have commissioned works from her, she has had composition concerts in Finland, and in the academic year 1997-98 she was guest Professor of Composition at the Sibelius Academy.
"In her early period in the late 1970s, Saariaho wrote several lyrical, delicate and melodically expressive vocal works. Her focus soon moved from melody to rich tonal colour and harmony, two mutually complementary elements that are closely related to one another. From the early 1980s onwards, Saariaho's music has been characterized by sound surfaces rich in detail, often hovering between pure tones and noise; delicately lyrical, evocative moods; and processes of change unfolding in slow, organic growth and evolution. There is no traditional harmonic structure, counterpoint or pulsating rhythm in works from this period.
"Towards the end of the 1980s, Saariaho's works began to acquire a more definite profile as the dream-like slowness of the earlier works began to subside. In the 1990s, her trend towards a more powerful mode of expression and more abrupt shifts has strengthened, and even melody has reappeared as a significant element in certain works. However, rich tonal colour and meticulously planned details remain important.
"In painting her original and individual landscapes in sound, Saariaho has often used state-of-the-art technology, for instance tape music, live electronics or computer assistance. Modern technology is often seen as the antithesis of delicate lyricism, but Saariaho's works demonstrate that this need not be the case. Saariaho has also worked with many top musicians of our time; for instance, her string quartet 'Nymphea' (1987) was written for the Kronos Quartet, while the orchestral works 'Du cristal' (1990) and '...O la fumée' (1990) were written for Esa-Pekka Salonen, the violin concerto 'Graal thédtre' (1994) for Gidon Kremer and the song cycle 'Château de I'âme' (1996) for soprano Dawn Upshaw.
"Saariaho's output includes orchestral, chamber, solo and vocal music. Often there is a tape involved. Saariaho has also written several works that have a dramatic or cross-discipline element, including the radiophonic work 'Stilleben' (1988), the dance work 'Maa' (Earth, 1991) commissioned by the Finnish National Ballet and choreographed by Carolyn Carlson, and various multimedia and film music projects. Her most extensive project to date is an opera commissioned by the Salzburg Festival for 2001, based on the real-life history of a 12th-century troubadour, Jaugre Rudel.
"'Verblendungen' ('Dazzlements'), commissioned by the Finnish Broadcasting Company (1982-84), was Saariaho's first extensive work after finishing her studies, a sort of transition ritual in becoming a full-blown artist. Like many of Saariaho's works, it found its origin in a visual idea, a thick brush-stroke thinning out gradually. In the music, this is reflected in the overall form, an enormous diminuendo beginning in an opening Big Bang and continuing throughout the work. In this sense, Verblendungen is a fine example of the slow processes of change typical of Saariaho's music in the early 1980s.
"'Verblendungen' is written for a 35-member orchestra, smaller than a normal symphony orchestra, and a tape prepared by Saariaho herself at the GRM Studio in Paris. The tape is based on two sounds played on a violin, a bowed sforzato and a pizzicato. This was the first time that Saariaho used a pre-prepared tape with live instrumentalists. The relationship between the musicians and the tape is an important dimension in the work, and it changes during the course of the work. At first, the orchestra is bright in sound and the tape is rough and noisy, but at the end the orchestra sounds electronic and the tape is crystal clear. However, the orchestra and tape intertwine to produce a rich and nuanced image in sound.
"Whereas 'Verblendungen' was sparked by a brush-stroke, 'Lichtbogen' for nine musicians and live electronics ('Light arcs', 1985-86), commissioned by the French Ministry of Culture, was prompted by the Northern lights. It is an extremely sensitive, finely tuned and vibrant piece that is fundamentally static yet is constantly moving and alive. Various colours and noise-like sounds shimmer and undulate in a ghostly, nebulous musical space.
"There is also a more theoretical aspect to 'Lichtbogen'. Saariaho used a computer in writing this work; this was the first time she used a computer with a purely instrumental work. The basic material consisted of harmonics played on a cello; when bow pressure is increased, the notes break up into noise. A computer analysis of this phenomenon generated the harmony and sound models that Saariaho then translated into music for the musicians to perform, complementing the sound spectrum with live electronics, i.e. electronic processing of sound in real time in concert.
"Like 'Lichtbogen', 'Io' (1986-87) for chamber orchestra, tape and live electronics was also inspired by the cosmic dimension of the starry sky. The title refers to one of the moons of Jupiter, although it is tempting to interpret it as the Italian word for 'I'. 'Io' was commissioned by IRCAM for its 10th anniversary concert at the Centre Pompidou.
"In terms of musical material, Saariaho again started off small, with an analysis of individual sound phenomena, in this case noise-like sounds produced on a double bass and a flute. She then transposed the models she had worked out onto a new level, a larger scale. 'Io' is a synthesis of musical approaches in the sense that it has a tape like 'Verblendungen' but also live electronics like 'Lichtbogen'. The tape has quite an independent role in places, and it even has a three-minute 'solo' towards the end. In terms of expression, 'Io' heralded a shift towards a more many-sided and complex texture.
"Kaija Saariaho has said that one of the crucial insights underlying the radiophonic work 'Stilleben' ('Still life', 1987-88) came to her while sitting in a train. As darkness falls, the landscape outside fades from view and the passenger's face begins to show in the window. This poetic experience points two ways with regard to 'Stilleben': firstly, to the gradual processes of change so important to many of Saariaho's works; and secondly, to the fundamental themes of 'Stilleben'. According to Saariaho, 'Stilleben' is about travelling, distance and communication between people separated from one another or from their homeland. It is easy to imagine that there is something very autobiographical in this theme for Saariaho, a Finn living in Paris and doing a lot of travelling.
"'Stilleben' was commissioned by the Finnish Broadcasting Company. It received a prize in the radiophonic works category in the Prix Italia competition in 1988, and in the following year it received the Ars Electronica prize. A 'radiophonic' work is a special kind of taped work that, as the name says, is designed to be played on radio, not in concert. Its means vary, but usually it is something between a radio play and electronic music.
"True to the nature of radiophonic works, 'Stilleben' contains a variety of material: speech in three languages (Finnish, German, French), singing, instrumental music (including extracts from 'Lichtbogen'), various concrete sounds for example from metro stations, and various types of acoustics. The texts are from letters by Franz Kafka discussing the effect of separation on communication; Saariaho has also used the poetry of Paul Eluard and artist Wassily Kandinsky. Saariaho approaches this rich and varied material more as a composer than as a storyteller. In fact, the work does not come across as a clear plot structure; rather it involves associations awakened by various situations and moods, a sort of poetry in sound that has themes and content but not precisely defined meanings.
"'Jardin secret' ('Secret garden') is a curiosity-provoking title that seems to evoke the composer's innermost thoughts. Saariaho has given this title to three works in which she has explored various parameters of music through the same basic model, using a computer. The first work of these is purely for tape (1984-85). The next to be completed was 'Jardin secret II' for harpsichord and tape. The concluding work, written for string quartet and live electronics, is 'Nymphea' (1987), sub-titled 'Jardin Secret III'.
"'Jardin secret II' is different from Saariaho's earlier compositions. It is energetic and rhythmic to the point of being chopping, The harpsichord part is restricted to a few effective basic gestures: trills, tremolos, chord ostinatos and short sharp figures. Saariaho has edited the tape using harpsichord sounds and human heavy breathing. 'Jardin Secret II' is an important work in that it helped open up a newer, more serious approach in the composer's musical thinking.
"'Petals' (1988) for cello and live electronics is a sort of associate member in the 'Jardin secret' series. The material in the work derives largely from the string quartet 'Nymphea' ('Jardin secret III'). The titles also allude to the same sort of sphere, Nymphea meaning 'waterlily'. In discussing 'Petals', we must also mention the contribution of cellist Anssi Karttunen, one of Saariaho's favourite musicians who provided the inspiration for the work and to whom it is dedicated. Saariaho has described the musical concept of 'Petals' thus: 'Petals is about contrasting elements, which here consist of pale colour on one hand and events whose kinetic energy is clearly based on rhythmic and melodic gestures on the other. These more precisely sketched shapes go through a number of changes and finally blend into the less dynamic yet intensive colour tapestry of the opening.'" (Kimmo Korhonen, tr. Jaakko Mäntyjärvi. From the liner notes.)
Performers: Avanti! Chamber Orchestra, Jukka-Pekka Saraste, Kaija Saariaho, Jukka Tiensuu, Anssi Karttunen, Endymion Ensemble, John Witfield
1.1. Verblendungen
1.2. Lichtbogen
1.3. Io
1.4. Stilleben
2.1. Jardin Secret II
2.2. Petals
2.3. Lichtbogen
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