Le Nord : revue internationale des Pays de Nord - 01.06.1941, Side 212

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LE NORD
fatherland and gave it patriotic songs which have lived up to the
present time with undimmed vigour. Of these the National
Hymn, composed to Runeberg’s words, comes first (1848).
Gradually the number of gifted composers finding expression in
the composition of romantic songs, patriotic songs and also more
exacting forms of music increased, and when in 1882 the establish-
ment of the central institutions of musical life was effected
through the initiative of Martin Wegelius and Robert Kajanus,
the foundation was laid for the reception of a genius in music.
And he arrived, bringing Finnish music its own new melody.
Jean Sibelius began his career as a musical youth, whose
thoroughly personal originality attracted the attention of his
circle of friends and schoolmates. Under the guidance of Wegelius
he composed chamber-music, but the flashes of his imagination
could not fit in with the severe and authoritative pedagogic ten-
dency. By the time he had finished his studies at the Musical
Academy, he was already a young master of composition, who
had composed several notable works and of whom his country
expected great things.
The next phase in Sibelius’ life was a sojourn in Berlin and
Vienna for the purpose of continuing his studies. At this time he
got married and through his wife, Aino Jarnefelt, he came into
contact with a famous family of artists, with the cultivation of
Finnish national ideas and with “the young Finland.” During
these years several compositions which were presented in Helsinki
were produced and while in Vienna he began his first great work
in the sphere of Finnish national music, a symphonic poem, “Kul-
lervo,” for solos, choir and orchestra. Experiments in analyzing
the musical influences to which Sibelius had been subject at that
time seem to be doomed to failure, for his artistic personality was
independent and unique to such a degree — but in any case he
was an artist of the “new spirit.” In orchestral composition he
won his first great victories as a creator of vividly picturesque
program-music. In the tragic tale of Kullervo from Kalevala,
the subject of his first masterpiece, he found a rich source of
imagery, which caused his genius to blossom out. The first per-
formance of “Kullervo” in Helsinki 1892 was an event which
clearly showed that Finland had got a great composer, “who had
an absolutely new conception of a subject, a great talent for
sensing the unique in the character of the Finnish people and the
nature of Finland, and at the same time he had the whole power