Score Club - Finlandia, Jean Sibelius
Welcome Score Club!
This page will be our primary source of information, and will be updated each week with new information and helpful hints. But first, we will start with the reason why we are all here….the music!
Finlandia, Op. 26
OrchestraOne’s season theme is “Home", and we could think of no better piece than Jean-Sibelius’ (1865-1957) Finlandia to kick off the season. Written as part of a larger commemoration of Finnish history, it evokes the struggle and strength of the Finnish people, the natural landscape of the country, and the hope that Sibelius had for his home. The piece quickly became the unofficial national anthem of Finland.
What makes the piece so special is that it is not only a literal interpretation of Sibelius’ home country of Finland, but a journey of hope, determination and the resiliency of people while facing difficult odds. Written as a covert way to protest censorship from an oppressive government (more on the history later!) it brings us to Sibelius’ home in Finland, but also helps us to find the “Home” within ourselves.
Jean Sibelius, 1913.
RLPO plays Jean Sibelius masterpiece Finlandia JEAN SIBELIUS Finlandia Vasily Petrenko
Let’s get to the music!
To the left are two videos of Finlandia, one with the orchestra, and one with the score if you would like to follow along with the music. You can also download the score for free here!
The first (and most important) thing to do with any piece is to listen, listen, listen. The only goal here is to enjoy the music! Make sure to head over to our active and engaged listening page to read more about how to listen really well.
Once you have had a chance to listen through a few times, you can start getting a bit more specific. Pick some musical moments (up to five) that particularly stand out. Try to keep these moments small: a cymbal crash, a sudden change in “color”, the moment where a particular instrument enters, etc. These spots will help you form a larger narrative of the piece later on. Remember, if you notice these moments, it’s because the composer wanted you to.
Think of the musical moments you chose as important pillars in the piece - punctuations at the end of a musical sentence, moments of change or climax etc. Now start to build out from those moments. What comes immediately before and after your moment? Is there a long build up before it? Is there a sudden change right after? Now move further and further away from your moments, always using them as your reference points, and always making sure you’re thinking about how one part of the music leads to the next. How many “sections” do you think there are? How do these sections compare musically? What purpose do you think your moments might serve?
All this work is going to lay the foundation for understanding this piece as deeply as we can. We are essentially getting the “lay of the land” so we can map our own interpretation.
Welcome to week two of Score Club!
Let’s put the piece into context!
Finlandia isn’t JUST Finlandia, and in fact isn’t even the real name of the piece! It is part of a larger, seven-part piece that depicts the history of Finland and its people. What we know as Finlandia is the last of these segments, with the original title of: Finland Awakes.
Written for the press celebrations of 1899, it was a covert way of protesting renewed Russian censorship as part of Russification. See the painting by Edvard Isto to the right, painted in the same year that Finlandia was written.
Specifically, 1899 saw the February Manifesto. Given by Nicolas II, it essentially gave Russia the right to rule over Finland in many ways, as well as greatly increased censorship over art and speech.
Edvard Isto's painting Attack (1899) symbolizes the beginning of Finland's Russification. The two-headed eagle of Russia is tearing away the law book from the Finnish Maiden's arms.
Something to think about…
What is the significance of the original title of the piece, Finland Awakes? What do you think Sibelius means by “Awakes,” and how does that “awakening” come through in the music? What could an awakening sound like musically? Do any of the moments you chose from last week sound like or add to that awakening?
Let’s take that idea a bit further…
One of the wonderful things about music is that it can be universal and specific simultaneously. That is, it can speak to one particular thing or individual, but at the same time speak to something much bigger. Something we all experience. In this case, let’s focus on how the idea of awakening can stand for three things in Finlandia:
1.The awakening of Finland: Rife with political strife, what does Sibelius mean by this?
2. The awakening of ourselves: Can the Finnish awakening Sibelius is specifically depicting be related to our own, personal kind of awakening?
3. The awakening of humanity: The term “awaken” and its synonyms (enlightenment, rebirth, resurrection etc.) have been used in philosophy, religion, psychology and the arts for centuries. What does this mean to you?
Most importantly, how does Sibelius portray this idea?
Do you feel that Sibelius accomplishes the goal of getting the idea of an awakening across? If so, how does he do it? Think about the trajectory of the music. How does the music start vs. end, how do they compare, and what could that mean? Are there moments within the piece that are integral to the “story” that Sibelius tells?
Welcome to week three! Time for MORE MUSIC!
First, It’s always important to explore other music that was being written around the same time as a given piece to help contextualize it’s place in the development of music. It helps us determine what makes it unique, how it held on to tradition, and how it may have revolutionized music.
It’s especially important here, considering the circumstances surrounding the creation of Finlandia, that we peer into the country whose government regulations Sibelius was covertly criticizing, Russia.
To the right is Anton Arensky’s Ryabinin Fatasia on Two Russian Folksongs for piano and orchestra, written in the same year.
How does this music sound similar, or different from the Sibelius, and what could those similarities or differences represent in their own separate worlds?
What about the inspiration for their pieces? Can they be seen to both be coming from the same nationalistic ideas?
Music from around the world in the same year…
From France, Ravel’s Pavane for a Dead Princess, inspired by dance and certain Spanish music and traditions, continues the development of the (at the time) new sounding Impressionistic movement in music.
From Germany, Arnold Schoenberg, one of the founding fathers of modern music, wrote one of his most important works, Verklärte Nacht (Transfigured Night), paving the way for revolutionary composition techniques and brand new sounds.
From the Unites States, The “King of Ragtime,” Scott Joplin wrote one of his most well know compositions, Maple Leaf Rag.
With every new piece of music, the composer paves the way for something new. Nationalism in music and art was not a new idea when Sibelius wrote Finlandia, but how this music became something so much more to the Finnish people was unique. It’s adoption as the countries unofficial national anthem, and it’s unbreakable connection to the Finnish people have inspired generations composers to write music that incorporates their own national anthems. Here are some that were written very recently!
New York City composer Jessie Montgomery wrote Banner in 2014 for the 200th anniversary of the American National Anthem, written by Francis Scott Key.
Brazilian Composer Clarice Assad wrote Terra Brasilis in 2013 as a “Fantasia on the Brazilian National Anthem.” It is a wonderful piece that isn’t only a tribute to the Anthem, but to the history, country and people of Brazil.
THAT’S a lot of music! Some of it is very similar to Finlandia, and others as different as it gets! We are lucky in this era of technology and knowledge that we are able to look into the past and contextualize a given piece into it’s musical place. What makes Finlandia Unique from the other pieces here? What ties them all together? Listen for similar musical moments, think about the inspiration behind the music, and try to get a sense of what the composers are trying to accomplish through their music. Are they attempting to reach similar goals?
Welcome to week four!
This week we get to the heart of the music. Score club not only exists as a way for us to aesthetically examine great works of art, but as a way to extract the profound meaning in each piece.
This isn’t easy! Discovering how a piece of music speaks to you can be a long and difficult process. We can hear beauty, dissonance and resolution instantly, but finding the meaning that lies underneath these sounds means looking inward, being vulnerable, and trusting yourself.
So let’s go back. Take a listen again (video to the left) but this time, create your own narrative. Finlandia no longer belongs to Sibelius, it belongs to you.
Try the following:
I hope that over the past few weeks you have all been emotionally effected by this piece, and those emotions have deepened as you listened and learned more. Try now to associate the musical moments that most effect you (you can use the moments you picked from week one as a guide) with a specific time in your life when you felt the emotion it evokes. Emotions are infinity complex, and relating this music to your own experience helps explore those complexities.
Start bridging the gap between these moments. If the opening of the piece reminds you of a dark time in your life, and the faster part reminds you of a more joyous time, what happened in-between? What kind of change is there is the music and how does that effect the trajectory of your emotions? How for example, does Sibelius manage to go from what sounds like utter dejection, to optimism, to hope, to triumph, and how does that journey relate to your own life?
Now try to broaden your own experience in the music. That is, what about your interpretation and personal life experience relates to all of humanity? How does the narrative that Sibelius creates exemplify the struggle, sadness, joy and love that every human has felt at one point in their lives?
