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Jean Sibelius and His World
Perhaps no twentieth-century composer has provoked a more varied reaction among the music-loving public than Jean Sibelius (1865-1957). Originally hailed as a new Beethoven by much of the Anglo-Saxon world, he was also widely disparaged by critics more receptive to newer trends in music. At the height of his popular appeal, he was revered as the embodiment of Finnish nationalism and the apostle of a new musical naturalism. Yet he seemingly chose that moment to stop composing altogether, despite living for three more decades. Providing wide cultural contexts, contesting received ideas about modernism, and interrogating notions of landscape and nature, Jean Sibelius and His World sheds new light on the critical position occupied by Sibelius in the Western musical tradition.
The essays in the book explore such varied themes as the impact of Russian musical traditions on Sibelius, his compositional process, Sibelius and the theater, his understanding of music as a fluid and improvised creation, his critical reception in Great Britain and America, his "late style" in the incidental music for The Tempest, and the parallel contemporary careers of Sibelius and Richard Strauss.
Documents include the draft of Sibelius's 1896 lecture on folk music, selections from a roman a clef about his student circle in Berlin at the turn of the century, Theodor Adorno's brief but controversial tirade against the composer, and the newspaper debates about the Sibelius monument unveiled in Helsinki a decade after the composer's death.
The contributors are Byron Adams, Leon Botstein, Philip Ross Bullock, Glenda Dawn Goss, Daniel Grimley, Jeffrey Kallberg, Tomi Makela, Sarah Menin, Max Paddison, and Timo Virtanen.
The essays in the book explore such varied themes as the impact of Russian musical traditions on Sibelius, his compositional process, Sibelius and the theater, his understanding of music as a fluid and improvised creation, his critical reception in Great Britain and America, his "late style" in the incidental music for The Tempest, and the parallel contemporary careers of Sibelius and Richard Strauss.
Documents include the draft of Sibelius's 1896 lecture on folk music, selections from a roman a clef about his student circle in Berlin at the turn of the century, Theodor Adorno's brief but controversial tirade against the composer, and the newspaper debates about the Sibelius monument unveiled in Helsinki a decade after the composer's death.
The contributors are Byron Adams, Leon Botstein, Philip Ross Bullock, Glenda Dawn Goss, Daniel Grimley, Jeffrey Kallberg, Tomi Makela, Sarah Menin, Max Paddison, and Timo Virtanen.
- GenresMusic
384 pages, Paperback
First published August 8, 2011
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
March 21, 2017
This 2011 book is a collection of essays on various aspects of Jean Sibelius’ life and work, and not only, as it includes some source documents that may be little known to those passionate about this composer.
Philip Ross Bullock starts off with an essay on just how linked to the “Russian tradition” Sibelius might be, tracing evolutions in his Late Romantic language that ultimately distinguish him apart form it. Jeffrey Kallberg’s “Theatrical Sibelius: the melodramatic lizard” focuses on Sibelius’ rather neglected occasional music for the theatre, especially the music he wrote for two scenes of Mikael Lybeck’s play "Ödlan". Daniel M. Grimley also takes up a work originally written for the theatre, Sibelius’s Tempest music, and shows how the author was self-consciously exploring a "late style" inspired rather by Shakespeare’s Prospero.
One of the most interesting papers here is Bryon Adams’s contribution on Sibelius’s place in British music. It is well known that Sibelius was cherished by British audiences and critics in the first half of the 20th century, but Adams shows how it was, oddly enough, the Symphony No. 4 that won British critics over. Furthermore, Adams draws on writings of these decades to show that, sadly, Sibelius was so welcome in part because of the scientific racism then in vogue: even music critics went for eugenics, and Sibelius as a "Nordic" composer was a lot more desirable than some "Mediterranean" French or Italian model. Max Paddison’s “Art and the ideology of nature” deals similarly with Sibelius’s reception by a Central European society obsessed with “nature” and purity, similar to that of Knut Hamsun’s.
Glenda Dawn Goss’ essay also deals with Sibelius’ reception beyond Finland, but in this case it is the United States. The reader learns how Sibelius’ popularity was partially due to Finnish immigrant musicians, and how Finlandia has become the composer’s most popular piece there, often set with different words and not even recognized as a foreign work.
Finally, there are two essays comparing Sibelius to other artists. Sarah Menin sets the composer’s work and that of Finnish architect Alvar Aalto side by side, though unfortunately illuminating connections are rare and mainly this is an opportunity for the author to gush about Aalto. Leon Botstein compares the trajectories of Sibelius and Richard Strauss in the 20th century.
The Documents part of the book is varied. It begins with selections from Adolf Paul’s A Book about a Human Being, a novel written by a companion of the young Sibelius in their Berlin days and a lightly fictionalized account of their life there. An essay by Sibelius on folk music and its influence on classical music is the only document by the composer himself. There is then a brief selection by Erik Furuhjelm’s early survey of Sibelius. Most notorious here will probably be Theodor Adorno’s writings on Sibelius: he doesn’t hold back about how awful he thinks the Finnish master’s music is! Finally, some of the polemics in the Finnish press during the 1960s unveiling of Helsinki’s Sibelius monument are reprinted.
Philip Ross Bullock starts off with an essay on just how linked to the “Russian tradition” Sibelius might be, tracing evolutions in his Late Romantic language that ultimately distinguish him apart form it. Jeffrey Kallberg’s “Theatrical Sibelius: the melodramatic lizard” focuses on Sibelius’ rather neglected occasional music for the theatre, especially the music he wrote for two scenes of Mikael Lybeck’s play "Ödlan". Daniel M. Grimley also takes up a work originally written for the theatre, Sibelius’s Tempest music, and shows how the author was self-consciously exploring a "late style" inspired rather by Shakespeare’s Prospero.
One of the most interesting papers here is Bryon Adams’s contribution on Sibelius’s place in British music. It is well known that Sibelius was cherished by British audiences and critics in the first half of the 20th century, but Adams shows how it was, oddly enough, the Symphony No. 4 that won British critics over. Furthermore, Adams draws on writings of these decades to show that, sadly, Sibelius was so welcome in part because of the scientific racism then in vogue: even music critics went for eugenics, and Sibelius as a "Nordic" composer was a lot more desirable than some "Mediterranean" French or Italian model. Max Paddison’s “Art and the ideology of nature” deals similarly with Sibelius’s reception by a Central European society obsessed with “nature” and purity, similar to that of Knut Hamsun’s.
Glenda Dawn Goss’ essay also deals with Sibelius’ reception beyond Finland, but in this case it is the United States. The reader learns how Sibelius’ popularity was partially due to Finnish immigrant musicians, and how Finlandia has become the composer’s most popular piece there, often set with different words and not even recognized as a foreign work.
Finally, there are two essays comparing Sibelius to other artists. Sarah Menin sets the composer’s work and that of Finnish architect Alvar Aalto side by side, though unfortunately illuminating connections are rare and mainly this is an opportunity for the author to gush about Aalto. Leon Botstein compares the trajectories of Sibelius and Richard Strauss in the 20th century.
The Documents part of the book is varied. It begins with selections from Adolf Paul’s A Book about a Human Being, a novel written by a companion of the young Sibelius in their Berlin days and a lightly fictionalized account of their life there. An essay by Sibelius on folk music and its influence on classical music is the only document by the composer himself. There is then a brief selection by Erik Furuhjelm’s early survey of Sibelius. Most notorious here will probably be Theodor Adorno’s writings on Sibelius: he doesn’t hold back about how awful he thinks the Finnish master’s music is! Finally, some of the polemics in the Finnish press during the 1960s unveiling of Helsinki’s Sibelius monument are reprinted.
March 18, 2025
Great collection of essays on Sibelius. Some near the end seemed less essential but usually had some good moments. The first half of the essays were all absolutely fantastic.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews