Sibelius in Miniature—and in Finnish
WARNER APEX 09274 06072 (76:23)
Here’s a curious thing: some composers write for strings the way Brahms wrote for piano—as if the medium were an extension of their own nervous system. Sibelius belonged to that tribe. These smaller works, gathered from various corners of his output and recorded in a Finnish church back in 1993, prove the point even when the music itself doesn’t quite reach the heights of Tapiola or the Fourth Symphony.
The Ostrobothnian Chamber Orchestra under Juha Kangas plays with that particular blend of warmth and restraint that Finnish ensembles seem to absorb with their mother’s milk. The sound—captured in Kaustinen Church—is genuinely exceptional. There’s air around the instruments, a natural bloom to the string tone that Warner’s reissue preserves beautifully. When the lower strings dig into those characteristically Sibelian pedal points, you hear the resonance of the space without any smearing of detail.
Rakastava, Op. 14, stands tallest here. This three-movement suite distills the composer’s melodic gifts into their essence—long-breathed phrases that seem to grow organically from silence, harmonies that shift like light on water. Kangas doesn’t push; he lets the music unfold with an inevitability that feels right. The middle movement, “The Path of the Beloved,” hovers in that modal twilight zone Sibelius loved, neither major nor minor but somewhere more ancient. The Ostrobothnians phrase it with real sensitivity, though I’ve heard the climax built with greater intensity elsewhere.
The Suite Champêtre, Op. 98b, comes from 1921—late enough that Sibelius had nothing left to prove. It’s salon music, essentially, but crafted with such care that you forgive its modest ambitions. The second movement “Melodie élégiaque” has a wistful charm, even if it treads dangerously close to the kind of thing one might hear in a better class of hotel lounge. Still, there’s genuine invention in the inner voices, those little chromatic inflections that prevent the music from settling into banality.
Jari Valo joins for the Suite for Violin and Strings, Op. 114—another late work, this time from 1929. His tone is warm without being soupy, his intonation secure. The piece itself feels like Sibelius looking backward, perhaps remembering his own ambitions as a young violinist. It’s pleasant. One wishes for more bite in the outer movements, though the central “"Andante"” achieves a genuine poignancy.
Now we come to the problem pieces. “Ett ensamt skidspör” and “Grevinnans konterfej” combine recitation with strings and harp—melodramas in the nineteenth-century sense. Without translations of the Finnish texts, they’re essentially closed to non-Finnish speakers. Lilga Kovanku and Matti Lehtinen declaim with conviction, the music supports them with atmospheric touches… and one is left admiring the craftsmanship while comprehending almost nothing of the dramatic content. It’s a bit like watching opera through frosted glass.
The Romance, Op. 42, and “"Andante" Festivo” fare better—the latter especially, with its hymn-like gravity and those characteristic Sibelian suspensions that pull at the heart. Kangas judges the tempo perfectly, never allowing sentiment to curdle into sentimentality.
The documentation disappoints. Warner has crammed the notes into microscopic type while leaving a full page blank—a design choice that borders on perverse. For a reissue aimed at budget-conscious collectors, this seems particularly shortsighted.
What we have, then, is a mixed but ultimately worthwhile collection. The best music here—Rakastava especially—deserves to be better known, and these performances serve it well. The album quality alone justifies the modest asking price. But the untranslated melodramas remain frustrating, and not everything on this generous program comes from Sibelius’s top drawer. Still, for those who love this composer’s way with strings—that unique combination of Nordic austerity and lyric warmth—there’s much to savor. Just don’t expect every track to reward repeated listening equally.
Terry Barfoot’s original assessment seems about right: interesting, sometimes splendid, but not essential.
