Category: Daily Dispatch

EIGHT DAYS OF SIBELIUS – DAY 6

I’ve got two Sibelius autographs in my possession. One is a signed copy of the famous Yousuf Karsh portrait from 1949 that I am currently using as my profile pic. I have been unable to locate it since my last move, but I assure you it’s around here somewhere!

The other, as you can see, when you click on the image to enlarge, is a note of thanks for a gift of cigars on the occasion of the composer’s 84th birthday. The accompanying photo (note the cigar in his hand) was copied for me by Anssi Blomstedt, the composer’s grandson. I had the two matted and framed together.

Evidently, Sibelius never lost his fondness for cigars – and vodka – though he abstained for a time, beginning in 1908, a harrowing period for the composer, during which he underwent a series of operations to have a cancerous tumor removed from his throat. Understandably, this brush with mortality dominated his thoughts until the clouds began to lift in 1913. Then, just as his prospects seemed to be improving, war enveloped Europe. It was during his health crisis that Sibelius composed his Symphony No. 4, a work he himself described as “a psychological symphony.” It is certainly the strangest of his oeuvre, unsettling, bleak, even desolate, but also quite beautiful.

Sibelius suffered periods of depression and self-doubt throughout his life, and they only worsened the more famous and acclaimed he became. Following his Symphony No. 7 of 1922-24, the purest distillation of his revolutionary approach to symphonic form (the entire work, a breathtaking, organic expanse of 20-25 minutes in length), and his sublime tone poem “Tapiola” of 1926 (Tapio being the forest god of the “Kalevala”), he acknowledged no further major works. Both pieces were met with some of the greatest acclaim of his career, but combined they help to induce such overwhelming pressure that he was essentially hobbled.

The Symphony No. 7:

“Tapiola”:

Sibelius had just turned 61 at the time “Tapiola” was premiered. Though for a time he would labor heroically at an Eighth Symphony, the effort made him miserable. Several leading conductors, including Serge Koussevitzky and Eugene Ormandy, were jockeying for the work’s first performance, and the composer experienced increased anxiety to meet expectations and push beyond what he had already expressed. A kind of paralysis ensued, though a number of people, pupils, colleagues, and family, insist that the symphony had been completed.

It is thought that Sibelius destroyed the work – actually I have it on good authority from Anssi, who says that he was present at its burning – but at least some of the sketches have survived. It was only in 2011 that a few fragments came to light. They are maddeningly gnomic and make the Sibelius lover yearn for more. What would it be like to hear a new Sibelius symphony?

But if the composer didn’t think it was up to his standards, perhaps it is best that it is lost. Here are two-and-a-half minutes that have survived:

Sibelius’ retirement was a long one. He would finish nothing of consequence for his last 30 years. This period has been enshrined in legend as the “Silence of Järvenpää.” During this time, though the composer was not overly fond of company, he continued to receive some notable guests at his home, Ainola, located 23 miles north of Helsinki. A number of these were still hoping to wrest from him the elusive Eighth Symphony.

Once, Ormandy showed up with the entire Philadelphia Orchestra. Though in frail health and cripplingly shy, the composer was convinced by Ormandy to walk out onto the porch and acknowledge the musicians. It was a raw day, and everyone had been waiting in the rain, but when the door opened finally, and the composer emerged, he was met with a resounding cheer.

Sibelius died two years later, in 1957, at the age of 91.