Kaija Saariaho

Kaija Saariaho (Finnish pronunciation: [ˈkɑi̯jɑ ˈsɑːriɑho]) (née Laakkonen, born 14 October 1952) is a Finnish composer.

Kaija Saariaho studied composition in Helsinki, Freiburg and Paris, where she has lived since 1982. Her studies and research at IRCAM have had a major influence on her music and her characteristically luxuriant and mysterious textures are often created by combining live music and electronics. Although much of her catalogue comprises chamber works, from the mid-nineties she has turned increasingly to larger forces and broader structures, such as the opera L’amour de loin, premiered at the 2000 Salzburg Festival^[1] (with a US premiere at the Santa Fe Opera in 2002), and Oltra mar for chorus and orchestra, commissioned by the New York Philharmonic. Her second opera, Adriana Mater, was commissioned for the Opéra National de Paris’ 2006 season. Her second string quartet, Terra Memoria, was commissioned for the Emerson Quartet by Carnegie Hall for a June 2007 premiere. The third opera, Émilie, has the life and death of Émilie du Châtelet as its topic. The librettist of all of the three operas is Amin Maalouf.

Life and work

Kaija Saariaho was born in Helsinki, where she attended the Helsinki Rudolf Steiner School, a school with a strong arts and music curriculum, for thirteen years^[2] and studied violin and piano at the Sibelius Academy. She later studied in Freiburg (under Brian Ferneyhough and Klaus Huber) and at IRCAM in Paris. Most critics, however, cite spectral music composers Gérard Grisey and Tristan Murail as her largest influences. Her work in the 1980s and 1990s is marked by its emphasis on timbre and use of electronics alongside traditional instruments; Nymphéa (Jardin secret III) (1987), for example, is for string quartet and live electronics. It contains an additional vocal element: the musicians whispering the words to a poem by Tarkovsky. In the late 1990s Saariaho began to expand beyond electronics, often writing strictly acoustic pieces, focusing increasingly on melody.

Saariaho was influenced by post-serialism, but she grew to find it too restrictive: "You were not allowed to have pulse, or tonally oriented harmonies, or melodies. I don't want to write music through negations. Everything is permissible as long as it's done in good taste."

She has won the Prix Italia and, in 1989, the Prix Ars Electronica; received commissions from Lincoln Center for the Kronos Quartet and from IRCAM for the Ensemble Intercontemporain; and has been the subject of a pan-European collaborative project to produce a CD-ROM Prisma about her work.

In 2000 she won the Nordic Council Music Prize for the work Lonh for soprano and electronics.

She was awarded the title Musician of the Year 2008 (announced by Musical America, the US publishing company for performing arts), for being "among the few contemporary composers to achieve public acclaim as well as universal critical respect".

Invited by Walter Fink, she was the 20th composer featured in the annual Komponistenporträt of the Rheingau Musik Festival in 2010, the second female composer after Sofia Gubaidulina. Music included Sept Papillons for cello solo (2000), played by Anssi Karttunen, and Quatre Instants for soprano and piano (2002), performed by Pia Freund and David Lively. An orchestral concert with the SWR Sinfonieorchester, conducted by Susanna Mälkki, featured Aile du songe, a flute concerto with soloist Camilla Hoitenga, and Laterna Magica.^[3]

Career highlights

• 1976—81 – studied composition with Paavo Heininen at the Sibelius Academy, Helsinki
• 1982 – attended courses in computer music at IRCAM, Paris and took up residence there
• 1986 – awarded Kranichsteiner Prize at Darmstadt
• 1989 – awarded Ars Electronica Prize for Stilleben and Io; one year residency at the University of San Diego
• 1991 – composition of ballet music Maa, premiered by Finnish National Ballet^[4]
• 2003 – awarded the Grawemeyer Award for L’amour de loin
• 2011 – Léonie Sonning Music Prize
• 2011 – Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording^[5]

Key works

• Verblendungen (1984; orchestra, electronics)
• Lichtbogen (1986; flute, percussion, piano, harp, strings, live electronics)
• Io (1987; large ensemble, electronics)
• Nymphéa (1987; string quartet, electronics)
• Petals (1988; cello, electronics)
• Du cristal... (1989; orchestra, live electronics)
• ...à la Fumée (1990; solo alto flute and cello, orchestra)
• Graal théâtre (1994; violin, orchestra)
• L’amour de loin (2000; opera)^[6]
• Orion (2002; orchestra)
• Adriana Mater (2005; opera)
• La Passion de Simone (2006; oratorio/opera)
• Notes on Light (2007; cello concerto)
• Terra Memoria (2007; string quartet)
• Laterna Magica, 2008
• Émilie (2010; opera)
• D'OM LE VRAI SENS (2010; clarinet concerto)

Selected Recordings

• Graal Théâtre – Gidon Kremer; BBC Symphony Orchestra; Esa-Pekka Salonen – Sony SK60817
• L’Amour de loin – Gerald Finley; Dawn Upshaw; Finnish National Opera; Esa-Pekka Salonen – Deutsche Grammophon DVD 00440 073 40264
• Nymphéa – Cikada String Quartet – ECM New Series 472 4222

Footnotes

External links

• Kaija Saariaho's homepage
• Chester Music Composer's homepage
• CompositionToday – Saariaho article and review of works
• Sanna Iitti , “Kaija Saariaho: Stylistic Development and Artistic Principles” International Alliance for Women in Music Journal, 2001
• (French) A biography of Kaija Saariaho, from IRCAM's website.
• Excerpts from sound archives of Saariaho's works.