Ida Moberg (1859–1947) was the first widely educated Finnish female composer. Born in Helsinki, she grew up in a musical family and studied singing and piano at the St. Petersburg...

Minna von Knorring (1846-1918) was a fascinating character in the musical scene of Helsinki. She had no formal music education but nevertheless she composed and published several songs. Some of...

Kalevi Aho’s Flute Concerto (2002) was initially inspired by the magnificent, enigmatic poetry of the Swede Tomas Tranströmer, but the vocal ideas nevertheless adapted themselves to the flute. There is...

Kalevi Aho’s Clarinet concerto (2005) has five movements played without pause. It was premiered in London by Martin Fröst in 2006 and is one of the best known and most...

Kai Nieminen’s Fragmental Reflections (2018) draws on the melancholy mood of the Finnish folk song "Tein minä pillin pajupuusta" (I made a willow whistle), familiar to most Finns. The emotional...

Matthew Whittall’s (b. 1975) Love is Little (2009) is a modern motet which uses a Shaker hymn as cantus firmus. The original melody is gradually slowed down, looped and fragmented,...

A pioneer of Finnish modern jazz, Heikki Sarmanto (1939–) is renowned for his renderings of jazz numbers. No wonder, therefore, that broken chords and familiar keys resonate and sit well...

Dedicated to and premiered by Petri Kumela, Pehr Henrik Nordgren’s (1944–2008) Come da lontano for guitar (2003) carries ideas from Nordgren’s previous work Amor – desesperada op. 120 (for soprano...

Tuomas Turriago’s Sonata for Guitar solo (2019, rev. 2020) reflects the main source of anguish of the 21st century: according to the composer things are growing so fast that we...

Kalevi Aho (b. 1949) was only 18 years old in 1967 when he completed his String quartet No. 1 in G minor. Nonetheless it was already the second one of...