Collaborations

Donald Macleod talks to the award-winning Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho about why she enjoys the collaborative process, with music from her Clarinet Concerto and Notes on Light.

“Music is a study of my own self and of the human spirit”, so says the Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho. Her passion for music is all consuming, with the inspiration to compose reflecting the breadth of her interests, in poetry, literature, fine arts, and cinematography to name but a few.
One of the foremost composers of our time, Kaija Saariaho was born in 1952 in Helsinki. She studied with the modernist Paavo Heininen, before founding the pioneering “Ears Open” group with fellow composer Magnus Lindberg. Her studies continued in Freiburg with Brian Fernyhough and Klaus Huber at the Darmstadt summer courses, and then at the ground-breaking IRCAM research institute in Paris.
Earlier this year Donald Macleod and Kaija Saariaho met up in Paris, the city where she’s made her home since 1982, to talk about five contrasting aspects of her music.

In the first part of this extended interview Kaija Saariaho has chosen to talk about the process of collaboration. Working with performers such as the cellist Anssi Karttunen, the flautist Camilla Hoitenga and the clarinettist Kari Kriiku, who've also become good friends, she talks about the music she’s written for them to play.

D’Om le vrai sens (excerpt)
Kari Kriiku, clarinet
Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra
Sakari Oramo, conductor

Notes on Light for cello and orchestra
II: On fire
III: Awakening
Orchestre de Paris
Anssi Karttunen, cello
Orchestre de Paris
Christophe Eschenbach, conductor

Noa Noa for flute and electronics
Camille Hoitenga, flute

D’Om le vrai sens
III : L’Odorat
IV : Le Toucher
Kari Kriiku, clarinet
Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra
Sakari Oramo, conductor

Produced by Johannah Smith for BBC Cymru Wales