Sebastian Fagerlund (b. 1972) was moved to write Helena’s Song for violin and orchestra (2023) by that character’s aria in Act II of his opera Höstsonaten (Autumn Sonata, Helsinki 2017), and it was commissioned jointly by the FRSO and the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra. Says Fagerlund of his work: “The most important scene in the opera is, for me, in Act II, when Helena, who until then has been mute, stands up and starts telling of her experience. I’m really pleased with this scene; it became strong and beautiful, and I’d been thinking for a long time of making it the basis for a work for solo violin and orchestra. John Storgårds, who conducted the premiere of the opera, immediately jumped at the idea.”

Helena’s Song is clearly a work in its own right. “At the beginning, the solo violin has a couple of phrases from Helena’s song in the opera, but it then goes off in new directions. It’s like a Stilleben – a still life; the main characters are absent but Helena’s emotions are present. Without words, it’s possible to enter even deeper into Helena’s mindscape.”

Helena’s Song adds a new dimension to Fagerlund’s works with a soloist. Generically, it harks back to a format much favoured in the Romantic era, but there are also examples in, say, Lutosławski’s Chain II (1984–1985) and Partita (1988), both for violin and orchestra. Cast in the role of both soloist and conductor tonight is John Storgårds. Considering that the piece is such a moving scene from an opera, it seems most appropriate for a single musician to crystallise Helena’s emotions.

Kimmo Korhonen

When I set out to compose a Double Bass Concerto for Niek de Groot, I had in mind a musical atmosphere that would feel like it emerged from some distant archaic time. The concerto structured as a series of variations, begins with a low melody on the double bass. Throughout the concerto the soloist constantly guides the orchestra towards new situations, at times a virtuoso, at times a meditator in a trance. The work is dedicated to Niek de Groot.

Sebastian Fagerlund

Lanterna – Seven Settings for violin, cello, piano and orchestra was completed in the spring of 2023, and it is the first of Fagerlund’s concertos with more than one soloist. A Triple Concerto is a notoriously challenging starting point and Fagerlund has approached this challenge in an original way, where the soloists gradually join the landscape painted by the orchestra to later form a soloist trio.

As a prelude to Lanterna, Fagerlund composed a Piano Trio called Remain (2022) for the Storioni Trio. The material of the slow movement in the Piano Trio functions as a musical core of the concerto, and from the hazy beginning the music progresses towards the fifth setting where a transcription of the slow piano trio movement is presented. From the fifth setting onwards the music moves away from the center of the work and the musical material takes on new shapes and forms. Fagerlund has said that an inspirational starting point has been the idea of a lantern at sea: “When you are close to it, you can see it clearly, but when you move away from it, the light starts to change and finally to disappear depending on the weather conditions.”

Kimmo Korhonen

Since the Violin Concerto ”Darkness in Light”, which was completed in 2012, Sebastian Fagerlund has given all his concert works titles. These titles almost always refer to the atmosphere and the sound world of the works rather than being specifically programmatic or descriptive.

So what can we expect of the new flute concerto (2020-21) called ‘Terral’?

 “The word ’Terral’ brings to mind the earth and ground, but it’s also the name for the warm desert wind that occurs in southern Europe,” Fagerlund says. “The name came to mind along with the shaping of the work’s soundworld. I thought of the material’s imagery, in which the soil or sand reveals new surfaces in the wind. It’s about constant change.”

Fagerlund’s previous concerto was a nearly 40-minute cello concerto ”Nomade” (2018) for large symphonic forces. In this new flute concerto, he wanted to approach the composition from a different perspective, consciously using a smaller ensemble, which suited the main commissioning orchestra, Tapiola Sinfonietta, well. The essential inspiration was also the flutist Sharon Bezaly, at whose request the work was born. According to Fagerlund, Bezaly’s wonderful sound and musicianship influenced the work:

“We were in frequent contact during the compositional process, and I sent her occasional sketches that we looked at, for example, the small glissands and ‘inflections’ which are more limited on the flute than on the clarinet.”

According to Fagerlund, the flute concerto represents a step forward in his production in terms of melody. It is also more tonally emphasized in harmony than his earlier works, although it does not follow the paths of traditional harmony. The sounding image is translucent and airy, as you would expect from a work related to the wind, and there are also fast “wind-like” gestures in the orchestra.

The concerto consists of three movements. The opening movement begins as a slow painting, in which the soloist initially uses an alto flute. The long canon of the strings, starting from the bass, contains the DNA of the musical material and also anticipates the main subject of the third movement. In the middle of the first movement is a more lively, fast- paced episode, which in turn anticipates the second part, from which the expression returns to the slower mood of the beginning.

The middle movement is a scherzo-like, lively dialogue between the soloist and orchestra. At the end of the movement, the mood stabilizes and leads uninterruptedly to the third movement, where the previous materials and dimensions of the work are combined and which are further complemented by the cadence of the flute. In the background of the third movement a traditional passacaglia structure can be detected.

Kimmo Korhonen (Translation Edition Peters)

The name of my Cello Concerto, Nomade, refers in an abstract way to searching and motion. The concerto begins with an expressive upward moving motif in the orchestral material which is a kind of harmonic-melodic DNA which permeates the entire work. The solo cello tries in its constant movement and search to reach this throughout the course of the piece but it is not until the Fourth Movement that the musical nucleus of the DNA is ultimately revealed.

 The concerto consists of six movements. The First Movement could be described as aphoristic in its musical character. The Second Movement gradually evolves into a duel between the orchestra and soloist. This movement is followed by an Intermezzo that leads to the Third Movement, a short and intense scherzo, where the harmony from the previous Intermezzo returns and interrupts the playful musical events. The solo cello alone begins the Fourth Movement with more and more instruments gradually joining in a gently swaying translucent sound world that alludes to both baroque and folk music. A Second Intermezzo leads to the Fifth Movement which is actually a cadence where the soloist also has the opportunity to improvise. The cadence leads us to the wild, ritualistic and fast Sixth Movement. The musical events are characterized by strong contrasts, which is also evidenced by the solo cello’s climb all the way to high C5 and later descending down to F sharp under the instrument’s low C. At the end of the work, the harmonic-melodic DNA takes shape one last time but then fades out, as a colour dissolving in liquid.

 The work is dedicated to Nicolas Altstaedt whose collaboration on this composition has left its mark. Nicolas’ profound and insightful musicianship has been immensely inspiring and at the same time the (in some way human) character of the cello came to remind me that our search never really ends: We are all nomads in one way or another.

Nomade was commissioned by the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra and the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra.

The World Premiere took place on the 15.2.2019 at the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg, Germany by the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra and soloist Nicolas Altstaedt conducted by Hannu Lintu.

Sebastian Fagerlund

Fagerlund says that the title Transit has no particular programmatic background. In the composer’s mind the word is associated with the way the material recurs and is transformed throughout the work, as if in a spiral. Fagerlund identifies three central elements in the piece: a descending line that appears not only thematically but also in condensing harmonies; arpeggio-like material that is typical for the guitar but can also be heard on other instruments; and a syncopated, rhythmically characteristic idea. The participation of the guitar means that the work is quieter and more transparent in expression than is usual in Fagerlund’s compositions.

Transit has six movements that are played without a break and, in terms of overall form, create a broad, heterogeneous arch. The work’s structural descending line appears straight away in the opening bars of the first movement. At first the music is coloured by a delicately transparent, almost pointillistic sonority, but events gather pace as the movement progresses, and the guitar engages in sometimes intense dialogue with the orchestra. The second movement is dominated by a mood of expectation, and the guitarist has the opportunity to improvise a brief cadenza above a background of sustained notes from the strings. In the third movement a thinned down and extended version of the descending motif is heard from the strings. The mood of the movement intensifies and leads to a powerful orchestral climax. The rhythms are more sharply angular and accented in the fourth movement, in which the guitarist also has percussive effects. The motion starts to level out in the fifth movement, leading to the meditative final movement. At the end of the piece the guitar’s true nature is revealed, as the descending line and arpeggio material are fused together.

Kimmo Korhonen (Translation Andrew Barnett)

Sebastian Fagerlund, born in Finland in 1972, is one of the spiritual post-modernist composers who, with their orchestral works, explore the modes of being that are found in the 21st-century world. These composers are receptive ‘earwitnesses’ to modern culture, sculpting our existential experiences into a sounding shape. Fagerlund’s music is characterized by incessantly flowing, layered soundscapes, in which forceful, angular figures and static, brooding motifs trace out strong lines or exist as independent blocks. This results in the impression of inexorable processes, natural or mechanical, indifferent to those who find themselves at the centre of the events.

His compositions are often shaped like journeys into the inner being, in the course of which we encounter unknown forces, Kafkaesque nightmares and austere contemplations, destructive maelstroms and regenerating tissue. His style can be characterized as ‘magic realism’: elements of surreality are combined with factual narrative. Beneath the surface we perceive a continuous feeling of transformation.  

By drawing upon the symphony orchestra’s spectrum of colours and extreme range, his music reflects not only the traditions of impressionism, modernism and post-minimalism but also a good ear for timbre-oriented musical genres, from cool jazz to ambient music. Likewise the composer takes into account the more physical elements of music: the beat and the decibel count. We hear incessant motifs, machine-like rhythmic figures and violent avalanches, which hint at Stravinskian primitivism and musical multiculturalism ranging from heavy metal to big band.

An openness to different musical traditions, musicianly ‘groove’ and an attitude that emphasizes the communality of art unite Fagerlund with Pekka Kuusisto, to whom the Violin Concerto Darkness in Light (2012) is dedicated. Kuusisto’s skill as a violinist and their artistic collaboration fuelled the compositional process.

The concerto begins with pitch-black motion in the orchestra, making use of – for example – the throbbing of the tuba, bass clarinet and timpani. From within this antimatter the solo violin rebounds into a shaft of light cast by the fluttering woodwinds, cymbals and tubular bells. And thus the soloist’s journey into the orchestra’s cosmic purgatory begins.

The violin grapples as if in perpetual motion, and descends into the abyss of micro-intervals. Its triple and quadruple stops are like straight and hooked punches aimed at the beats of the bass drum. It reaches impossible heights by means of harmonics, and bounces off the edge of inaudibility. It tunes in to the ratios of the universe and whistles through glissando trills as if electrified.

The composer has spoken of the soloist’s Don Quixote-like struggle against the orchestra’s different and various-sized machines. The challenge is divided into scenes, punctuated by pings, swishes and ‘exclamation marks’ on one and the same note. The impression is as if the soloist was proceeding from one reality to another parallel one. The journey is an arduous one – but, nevertheless, the violin’s picaresque virtuosity also radiates joy: the irresistible appeal of incomparable mastery.

The first movement culminates in a cadenza in which the soloist has the opportunity to improvise freely, which Kuusisto takes with enthusiasm. The cadenza begins in a meditative setting, somewhat in the manner of a Japanese garden. Then it flails and grinds in ever stranger sounds, as if the bow were an aerial and the violin a radio, picking up wondrous messages from another star.

The second movement is the work’s slow centrepiece, a subconscious entity like Tarkovsky’s Solaris, in which we hear strange scales, the desolation of open-sounding intervals and the sound of mysterious brass flying past. The direction is downward, inward, towards the core. The music falls apart into a very quiet state where all that can be heard is the friction between mind and matter – bare existence.

The third movement returns to earth. The soloist’s abrasive motifs and the orchestral groupings are placed in a broader perspective. The strings’ glissandos and the glockenspiel’s chromaticism wrench up like a film camera moving up and zooming out. The momentum increases, and for a moment the soloist seems to roam through the world’s violin concerto repertoire. The epilogue makes the listener stop and think; it is reduced to the essentials. 

According to the composer, the concerto’s title refers to the subtle narrative style of the Japanese author Haruki Murakami (b.1949), which mixes reality and the surreal. At the same time the name illustrates the music’s way of transcending distinctions. Darkness and light, tonality and atonality, orchestra and soloist, community and individual, destruction and renewal – there cannot be one without the other.

Light and darkness are traditional allegorical representations of life and death. As Murakami’s character says in the novella Firefly (Hotaru; 1983): ‘Death is not the opposite of life, but a part of it.’ Death illuminates life because being reminded of it intensifies the present moment.

Susanna Välimäki (Translation Andrew Barnett)

My Saxophone Concerto consists of two parts. The first one, ‘Arias’, begins with a heavy rhythmic pulse contrasted by the playful, almost cantabile virtuosity of the soloist. As the movement proceeds these contrasting musical elements begin to change and develop. They can be traced both in large and deep musical structures and on the surface level. Quite naturally the saxophone is the main character of the musical drama but its relationship to the orchestra is in perpetual change. Sometimes is rushes up to virtuoso fioriture, sometimes to rhythmic, almost dance-like dialogue with orchestral instruments, and sometimes it plays forth independent, expressive melodies.
The second movement ‘Nocturne’ is slow and poetic in character. Fragments built up from the previous movement’s musical material sometimes interrupt the surface of the movement; they seem to flow free and separated from earlier musical conncections and concept of time. The expression of the saxophone changes into more fragile, and little by little the music dissolves and leaves the listener in silence.
The work was composed with the funds provided by the Madetoja Foundation. It is dedicated to Olli-Pekka Tuomisalo.

Sebastian Fagerlund

My Clarinet Concerto consists of four movements; In the first movement ‘Entrata’ the clarinet gradually ‘brings the orchestra to life‘ by presenting different musical materials. The first part continues without interuption to the second part ‘Rituale’ where the role between the solo clarinet and the orchestra begins to change. A short intermezzo forms a bridge to the third, slow and intense movement ‘L´ombra muta‘. New layers and perspectives opens up in the music, but at the same time there is a motion inwards in the music towards something unvisible. After the third movement follows a second intermezzo in the form of a cadenza for clarinet. The wild solo leads towards the final and fourth movement ‘Urbana’ which is a minimalist, dancelike scherzo.

Working together with the brilliant and virtuoso clarinetist Christoffer Sundqvist has inspired me and also left its distinctive mark on the musical characters in the concerto.  The concerto which is commissioned by Christoffer Sundqvist, Conductor John Storgårds and Korsholm Music Festival was realized with generous support from the Madetoja Foundation, The Finnish Cultural Foundation and The Korsholm Music Festival.”

Sebastian Fagerlund

The title of the composition relates to a almost visual image of a “flow of sound” emanating from a ensemble I had when I started the compositional process. The material of the piece consists of two contrasting motivs wich constantly develop and collide with each other creating situations of both repellation and correlation. This motivistic dualism can be detected in the mikro- as well as the makro- structure of the piece.

Sebastian Fagerlund