Postcard from Finland no.2

Here are some links from the Lahti Sibelius Festival. The Finnish broadcaster YLE filmed all the concerts and broadcast them live in Finland. You can watch some of them on their website for the next couple of weeks. This link brings up ‘The Oceanides’ tone poem:

http://yle.fi/aihe/tapahtuma/2015/08/31/sinfonia-lahti-sibelius-festivaali-2015-318-592015

Most nights I was sitting in the choir section behind and above the orchestra, in the middle. You can see that’s pretty close.

There is an audio interview with Jon Anderson of the rock band Yes. He was present for the whole festival (a couple of minutes after someone told me that I walked straight past him in the foyer).

http://yle.fi/aihe/artikkeli/2015/09/05/sibeliuksen-musiikki-ja-taru-sormusten-herrasta-sisaltavat-samaa-energiaa

(I think you will have to copy this addresses into your browser – they’re not coming up as automatic links.) Other features can be found here:

http://yle.fi/aihe/klassinen/jean-sibelius-150v#section-73194

Several evenings we came out of the concert hall at about 9.30pm to fantastic sunsets over the lake:

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=lahti+sibelius+150+sunset&biw=1280&bih=884&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAmoVChMIy_mfz9_nxwIVgW0eCh0WwAsG#imgrc=4Vu4ptIEb9zlJM%3A

During a late afternoon reception hosted by the Finnish Sibelius Society we were told that the 150th anniversary of Sibelius’ birth is being celebrated by over 1500 concerts around the world!

You can find out more about Sibelius by visiting the webpage of the UK group Sibelius One.