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19 OCTOBER FRIDAY SERIES 4 Helsinki Music Centre at 7 Pm

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19 OCTOBER FRIDAY SERIES 4 Helsinki Music Centre at 7 Pm 19 OCTOBER FRIDAY SERIES 4 Helsinki Music Centre at 7 pm CONGRATULATIONS, KAIJA! Esa-Pekka Salonen, conductor Dawn Upshaw, soprano Tapiola Chamber Choir, coach Hannu Norjanen Jean-Baptiste Barrière, visualisation Video performers: Luca Veggetti, choreographer Gabrielle Lamb, dancer The visualisation of this concert is a birthday gift to Kaija Saariaho from Yle and Jean-Baptiste Barrière. Luigi Boccherini – Luciano Berio: Ritirata notturna di Madrid 10 min Maurice Ravel: Mother Goose Suite 16 min I Sleeping Beauty’s Pavane II Tom Thumb III Laideronnette, Empress of the Pagodas IV Beauty and the Beast V The Fairy Garden INTERVAL 20 min Kaija Saariaho: La Passion de Simone, concert performance 71 min Interval at about 7.40 pm. The concert ends at about 9.15 pm. Broadcast live on Yle Radio 1 and the Internet (yle.fi/rso) The concert will be recorded and later released on CD. We would therefore ask members of the audience to try not to cough during the performance. 1 MAURICE RAVEL KAIJA SAARIAHO: LA (1875–1937) MOTHER PASSION DE SIMONE GOOSE SUITE La Passion de Simone (2006) is an ora- Maurice Ravel composed his Mother torio by Kaija Saariaho about the life Goose (Ma Mère l’Oye), based mainly on and thoughts of Simone Weil. It is sco- ancient fairytales by Charles Perrault, red for solo soprano, choir, orchestra as a suite for two pianos in 1908 but and electronics. expanded it into a ballet three years la- The oratorio is a major addition to ter. His aim in Mother Goose was simp- the portraits of women presented by licity, though this is in fact misleading. Saariaho in her large-scale works: the Sleeping Beauty’s Pavane (Pavane de la unrequited love of L’Amour de loin, the Belle au bois dormant) radiates gent- conflict between revenge and motherly le melancholy, taking care not to wake love of Adriana Mater and the struggle the beauty as she slumbers. between work, love and birth of Émilie Tom Thumb (Petit Poucet) tries to en- du Chàtelet. All act in ways that are in- sure he will find his way home by stre- consistent and impractical. Love, for wing crumbs along the path. A solemn, them all, knows no compromise; it is enigmatic pentatonic sets the scene for above everyday reason and self-inter- an oriental ceremony as Laideronette, est. the Princess of the Padogas, enters the Other themes connected with water to bathe, accompanied by her Saariaho’s life and works also seem to retinue. Ravel tellingly dedicated the be woven into La Passion de Simone. encounter of Beauty and the Beast to The listener may, in its poetic tension, Erik Satie, who revelled in grotesque in the spreading of the text over diffe- confrontations. Out of a hole in the rent planes of reality and the projecti- ground a double bassoon comes craw- on of the words onto different worlds ling to join in a graceful dance with a of sound, catch echoes of earlier vocal clarinet. The dance by this mismatched works by Saariaho, right back to the pair nevertheless has the desired effect: very first songs. The oratorio ties in a passionate crescendo ends in a harp with the generic history via its struc- glissando that sends the double-bas- ture, its fifteen “stations” derived from soon theme soaring into the highest the fifteen Stations of the Cross. violin register – the kiss has transfor- Also present in the oratorio is med the monster into a prince. In the Saariaho’s characteristic striving to closing movement (Jardin féerique) the examine and capture the essence of prince’s kiss wakes the Sleeping Beauty sound, the innermost core most dif- to a fairy garden, from one dream to ficult to reach, and produced by elec- another. Cast in the leading role is a tronics. The soprano soloist is for the string sound tinged with nostalgia – a most part a narrator, like an Evangelist, reminder of both Ravel’s and everyone’s but at times also a sympathetic partici- childhood. 2 pant, Simone’s imaginary sister and at Abridged programme notes by Antti the end Simone herself. The choir and Häyrynen orchestra create a world for the soloist and electronics to inhabit. In her book Gravity and Grace, Weil described the spiritual dimension of seeing. “The use of reason makes ESA-PEKKA SALONEN things transparent to the mind. We do not, however, see what is transparent. Esa-Pekka Salonen is one of the We see that which is opaque through most celebrated conductors in the the transparent – the opaque which world today. He has been Principal was hidden when the transparent was Conductor and Artistic Advisor of the not transparent. We see either the dust Philharmonia Orchestra London sin- on the window or the view beyond the ce 2008 and Artistic Director of the window, but never the window itself.” In Baltic Sea Festival since 2003. After Simone, too, the truth is born of diffe- seventeen years at its helm as Music rent soundscapes and the relationships Director, he also holds the title of between them. Conductor Laureate of the Los Angeles Throughout her life Simone Weil Philharmonic since 2009. From 1984 sought redemption through suffering. to 1995 he was Chief Conductor of the Over the years, she has been criticised Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra. as being self-centred or mystic-fatalis- During the present season Salonen tic. She was not able to atone for hu- and the Philharmonia Orchestra are man sins, the worldly “gravity”, the pri- celebrating two centenaries in their mitive force that pull us down. All she concerts: the birth of composer could do was deny it by abstaining Witold Lutosławski and the premiere from it. of Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring. In 2013 By refusing to compromise, and ul- Salonen will conduct the performan- timately through her death, Simone ces of the long-awaited new produc- wished to show us mercy and found tion of Strauss’s opera Elektra at the peace, as does, at the end, the orato- Aix-en-Provence Festival. In addition to rio. The narrator, choir and orchestra the Philharmonia Salonen is a regular are the ceremonial witnesses to that guest with many of the world’s other process, and the listeners share in their finest orchestras. confusion. Among the numerous items in Esa- Like the Bach Passions, La Passion Pekka Salonen’s discography is a CD de Simone places a distant and scarce- of orchestral works by him with the ly credible event in a real context, but FRSO. In 2009 his disc of music by it does not offer salvation. For as it Sibelius and Schönberg with violinist says at the end, the world to which we Hilary Hahn and the Swedish Radio were abandoned is still the treacherous Symphony Orchestra was awarded a realm where the innocent tremble. Grammy, and this year he conducted 3 the Los Angeles Philharmonic in a Boston Symphony Orchestra and works disc (for Deutsche Grammophon) of by Debussy as the soloist with the Shostakovich’s Orango. London Symphony Orchestra, plus solo Salonen has been the recipient of recitals in Austin and on tour in Hawaii. many major awards, including the She will also be singing Bach, Handel UNESCO Rostrum Prize for his com- and Crumb with the St. Paul Chamber position Floof in 1992 and the Siena Orchestra and works by Donnacha Prize, given by the Accademia Chigiana Dennehy at Carnegie Hall, New York. in 1993; he is the first conductor ever A four-time Grammy Award winner, to receive this prize. In the UK he has Dawn Upshaw is featured on more been granted the Royal Philharmonic than 50 recordings, of music by Henryk Society’s Opera Award, and in France Gorecki, Mozart, Messiaen, Stravinsky, the rank of Officier de l’ordre des Arts Adams and others. Her most recent et des Lettres. He also holds an honora- release on Deutsche Grammophon is ry doctorate from the Royal College of Three Songs for Soprano and Orchestra, Music in London. the third in a series of acclaimed recor- dings of Osvaldo Golijov’s music. DAWN UPSHAW THE TAPIOLA Dawn Upshaw has achieved worldwi- CHAMBER CHOIR de celebrity as a singer of opera and concert repertoire ranging from the The Tapiola Chamber Choir, which gave sacred works of Bach to the freshest its debut concert in 1984, is known for sounds of today. She began her career its own concert productions, concerts as a 1984 winner of the Young Concert requested by professional orchestras Artists Auditions and the 1985 Walter and music festivals, and its long-term W. Naumburg Competition, and was commissioning and recording projects. a member of the Metropolitan Opera Tapiola Originals is an international Young Artists Development Program. collection of works commissioned from Her acclaimed performances on the composers in the Baltic Sea region. The opera stage comprise the great Mozart choir is involved in the National Library roles from Pamina in The Magic Flute Project documenting works by leading to Susanna in The Marriage of Figaro, Finnish choral composers. It has also as well as operas by Stravinsky, Poulenc contributed to recordings of Finnish and Messiaen and the very latest con- operas with the Finnish National Opera temporary music by such composers as Orchestra, the FRSO and the Helsinki John Harbison, Kaija Saariaho and John Philharmonic Orchestra and has per- Adams. formed great works of the Baroque and Highlights of the present season in- Classical eras under such celebrated clude Sibelius’s Luonnotar with the 4 foreign conductors as Peter Schreier, a choreographer and stage director in Harry Christophers, Roy Goodman and 1990.
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