Another Individual Baltic Voice

By one of those occasional coincidences that the spacings on the shelf have thrown up, I find that Sibelius is followed by another Finnish composer with this disk by the Lahti Symphony Orchestra conducted by Osmo Vanska of more music by Rautavaara. Somewhat controversially perhaps, I enjoyed the Rautavaara slightly more than the Sibelius this time around, not to say that I didn't enjoy the Sibelius but I was listening to that in slightly less relaxed circumstances. The Rautavaara works featured here are Symphony No 8 ( The Journey ) and Violin Concerto with soloist Jaako Kuusisto. The violin concerto is ostensibly in two movements but the first could be said to include a classical first movement and slow movement combined, while the second movement could be seen to include a scherzo and finale. The solo violin seems to move constantly forward encountering different and contrasting situations in what is becoming a familiar concept in moder violin concertos of which this is an early example, dating as it does from the mid seventies. Kuusisto gives a soulful performance in a work that by the composer's own admission borrows from the Balkans and the cityscape of New York as much as it does from the frozen north. The 8th symphony was written on the cusp of the new millenium and to some extent surveys the dying century on a journey through its many aspects. Motifs proliferate and there is a conscious desire to incorporate melody. Unlike many of Rautavaara's large orchestral pieces, it ends with an affirming fortissimo rather than fading away.