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reh. F - 5 mm. before reh. G
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Skills & Techniques: High Register, Loud Playing, Marcato Style, Rhythms
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Horn 1 (F)
Horn 2 (F)
Horn 3 (F)
Horn 4 (F)
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Berliner Philharmoniker (1984)
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Singapore Symphony Orchestra (2015)
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Composer & Composition Information
Jean Sibelius (1865-1957)
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Jean Sibelius was born in Hämeenlinna, Finland, on 8th December 1865, the second of three children. His father died when ‘Janne’ was only two. Although the language spoken at home was Swedish, Janne attended Hämeenlinna’s pioneering Finnish-speaking grammar school. Music was encouraged at home, and before long Janne was improvising and composing pieces of his own. Vattendroppar (Water Drops) for violin and cello (c. 1875) is believed to be his first surviving composition. In 1885 Janne finished school and moved to Helsinki, nominally to study law, although he also enrolled at the Music Institute. It was not long before the law studies were quietly dropped, and he started official composition studies under Martin Wegelius. His music from these years displays a seemingly inexhaustible melodic fecundity as well as an increasingly secure and original sense of form.
It was during his student years in Helsinki that Janne – now using the ‘music name’ Jean – met and fell in love with Aino Järnefelt. He numbered many future luminaries of Finnish culture among his friends, among them the authors Adolf Paul and Juhani Aho. He also befriended the composer and conductor Robert Kajanus and the pianist and composer Ferruccio Busoni. In 1889 Sibelius left Finland to pursue his studies abroad – first in Berlin and then in Vienna. In both cities he lived far above his means and enthusiastically nurtured a taste for fine wines and cigars. It was at this time that he became fully aware of the potential of the Finnish epic poem, the Kalevala, as a source of musical inspiration. He was soon hard at work on a massive five-movement piece for soloists, male choir and orchestra with a Kalevala text: Kullervo. Back in Finland, Sibelius conducted Kullervo to great acclaim in April 1892. The work marked his breakthrough and smoothed the way to his marriage to Aino that June. The text & image are reprinted from Sibelius One where more information about the composer can be found. |
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Finlandia
During the 1890s Sibelius took on the challenge of writing music that stirred Finnish patriotism in the face of Czar Nicholas II’s Russification policies. The composer wanted to create something recognizably Finnish, but without resorting to direct imitation of folk music. As he wrote to his wife Aino, “I would not wish to tell a lie in art … But I think I am now on the right path. I now grasp those Finnish, purely Finnish tendencies in music less realistically but more truthfully than before.” Many of his early efforts in this direction were ephemeral – a composer in search of his voice – but the 1899 Finlandia has transcended both its local association and its political objective. Originally the finale of a suite of incidental music to accompany a historical tableaux, it was performed first at an event whose announced purpose was support of a journalists’ pension fund but whose organizers sought to promote a spirit of national unity. The title Finland Awakens attracted negative attention from the czarist régime, so for a while the piece was known as Impromptu – surely one of the great misnomers in music history!
The text is written by & reprinted from Susan Key (Los Angeles Philharmonic) where more information about the composition can be found.
The text is written by & reprinted from Susan Key (Los Angeles Philharmonic) where more information about the composition can be found.
Notable Performances/Recordings:
NBC Symphony Orchestra (2017)
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (2012)
Minnesota Orchestra (2008)
Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra (1960)
NBC Symphony Orchestra (2017)
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (2012)
Minnesota Orchestra (2008)
Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra (1960)