Jukka-Pekka Saraste and Pekka Kuusisto conduct Thorvaldsdottir, Moussa, Clyne, and Brahms — With Kreeta-Julia Heikkilä

Jukka-Pekka Saraste, Pekka Kuusisto, and the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra present an eclectic, evocative program combining captivating contemporary works with a Brahms symphony that has been in the orchestra’s repertoire for over one hundred years. Starting as they mean to go on, the HPO opens the concert with the first ever Finnish performance of Aerality, a “magnetic and profound” masterpiece (Finnish Music Quarterly) by leading Icelandic composer — and the HPO’s composer-in-residence — Anna Thorvaldsdottir. Next, Samy Moussa’s hypnotic Stasis for eight spatialised French horns with gongs also gets its Finnish premiere. In the second half, Finnish violinists Pekka Kuusisto and Kreeta-Julia Heikkilä take the stage for Anna Clyne’s spellbinding double violin concerto, Prince of Clouds — with Kuusisto conducting as well as playing! — followed by Brahms’s sunny Second Symphony.

Photo © Felix Broede