Recently Heard: Symphony No. 8 (The Journey) & Harp Concerto

[ellyssian]

Einojuhani Rautavaara: Symphony No. 8 (The Journey) / Harp Concerto

Listening to contemporary classical composers can be a difficult task - you may be expecting something like Beethoven or Mozart, and the jarring odd angles may disrupt your sensibilities; worse, you could be one of those modern-artsy goons, and the smooth romantic tones just aren't edgy enough for your cooler-than-thou avant garde self. Of course, if you know where to look and you already know what you like, you'll already know which composers you prefer, or you simply don't classify anything made after [insert-date-here] to be music. The rest of the folks out there may be surprised at just how much variety there is - and how incredibly good modern symphonic compositions can be.

I first came across Rautavaara's music in a rather accidental fashion. For a while, back in the early to mid nineties, BMG had a nice little label - Catalyst - that specialized in music composed relatively recently. While I didn't quite snap up every title they produced, it came pretty close. One of those titles was Rautavaara: Cantus Arcticus / Pommer, Leipzig Radio Symphony.

For some reason, although I like work by composers from all over the world, certain areas seem to always create composers I'm drawn to: eastern Europe is one of those areas, and northern Europe another. Rautavaara is from Finland, which fits in with both categories, to a degree, but especially with the latter. His music captures some essence of those colder lands, snow-swept mountain vistas, and mystic forests.

The two pieces on this disc are quite recent - the disc opens with the Concerto for Harp and Orchestra, which was written in 2000, and ends with Symphony No. 8 "The Journey", composed the year before that.

As a musician, I particularly like the concerto format. The harp is one of my favorite instruments to hear in the solo spotlight, and one that doesn't have nearly enough composed for it. The three movements - pesante, adagietto, and solenne - all provide fitting settings for the beautiful melodies Marielle Nordmann coaxes from her harp. Two additional harps are also included in the scoring, giving more depth and texture to the solo instrument and the rest of the symphonic orchestra.

There's a sparseness in the opening of the 8th symphony, quiet sweeping strings painting the setting of the start of a journey. There's almost a minimalist - in the sense of Arvo Pärt, not, say, Philip Glass - approach, where the silence is clearly as important as the lack of silence. The music does grow and swell beyond that, and, despite its seeming simplicities, contains passages of great musical complexities. Indeed, in the liner notes, Rautavaara points out that, because the work was commissioned by the Philadelphia Orchestra, he "was able to make the second movement an extremely technically demanding virtuoso scherzo." Regardless, the technical demonstration doesn't detract from the musicality - the work remains accessible to the listener.

Although popularity of classical music has been waning - departments at record stores shrinking, specialized stores closing down, stations changing formats to talk radio, and other such deplorable actions - this should be one of those recordings that catches new listeners, lures them away from new age or symphonic metal or film scores to genuine classical music. Think of the snob factor you could wield when in the presence of an alleged classical aficionado who has only ever heard of the three big guys - Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart - and you bring out Rautavaara...

In all seriousness, if you have any interest in classical music, you should give this a listen and see a perfect example of what a contemporary composer can do.