Mikkola, Rautavaara, Saariaho. These names come from far away, still they sound familiar. Together with Lindberg and Franck - less exotic sounding, but equally Finnish - and accompanied by an array of other musicians, they all have one thing in common: they are part of classical music life in Brussels. This Finnish-Belgian connexion may not seem surprising, but it is fairly recent.

In 1900, the Finnish composer Jean Sibelius (1865-1957) and the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra visited the Belgian capital in the frame of a European concert tour. Brussels was not the tour's main goal, it rather seems that a concert in Brussels was a necessary stop on the way to the World Exhibition in Paris. The orchestra was not conducted by Sibelius, but by Robert Kajanus (1856-1933), the energetic Finnish conductor and founder of the orchestra. It is likely that neither the musicians nor the conductor ever suspected that their concert would be the beginning of the Finnish musical presence in Brussels. The fact that this event took place in 1900, on the edge of the 20th century, adds to its symbolic value. It reflects the nationalistic heritage of the 19th century as well as the 20th century tendency towards internationalisation.
Sibelius' importance cannot be underestimated. The composer of Finlandia was the first to give a musical identity to Finland. Together a group of other Finnish artists, he contributed to a national awareness, that would lead to the Finnish independency of 1917. Sibelius' nationalism, however, is imbedded in a universal artistic idiom: his musical message is not bound to borders.

In the interbellum period, the musical interaction between Finland and Belgium was materialised in the works of Erkki Melartin (1875-1937). Although this composer and pedagogue lived and worked in the shadow of Sibelius, he created a large oeuvre, combining romantic and modernist influences in a very personal lyrical style.
In early 1914, Melartin visited a number of European countries to study the organisation of higher music education, in order to improve the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, of which he had been the director since 1911. To that aim, he also visited the Brussels Conservatory, and became fascinated with Belgium. The Grand Place of Brussels and the Museum for Fine Arts left a deep impression on him. He also got acquainted with local literature, as is shown by his composition Le Réveil du Bois, based on a dramatic poem by the Belgian poet Victor Kinon (1873-1953). The link with Belgium goes further: Le Réveil du Bois was premiered in Helsinki on 15 May 1917. The Helsinki Orchestra was conducted by the composer in a charity concert for Belgian children who were suffering from the war.
Belgium plays a much more important role in Melartin's Lyric Suite No. 3, Op. 93. He composed it in 1915 as a sounding impression of his visits to the cathedral of Antwerp, the historical centre of Bruges, and the carillons the Low Countries are famous for. In the Pastorale, he refers to an unspecified painting in the Brussels Museum for Fine Arts, and the final Hymne describes a morning on the Belgian coast.
Melartin mentions his sources of inspiration on his original manuscript, but the concert program of the first performance doesn't mention the link to Belgium at all. One can speculate, if it may have been a conscious choice to let the music speak for itself, or if he deliberately wanted to avoid any label of being a program music composer. In those days in Finland, absolute symphonic forms of music were heeded in highest esteem.

From 1930 onwards, the Finnish pianist Hjördis Calas (1900-1950), resident in Brussels, was actively involved in promoting music from her native country. In a recital given on 21 January 1940 in the Brussels Conservatory, she performed music by Sibelius, Toivo Kuula (1883-1918) and Selim Palmgren (1878-1851). This was a charity concert for the Finnish Red Cross. A second charity concert was organised on 17 March 1940, this time not given by Finnish musicians, but by the Brussels Symphony Orchestra conducted by Arthur Prévost. The proceeds went to Finnish children and artists.

In 1941, Calas played piano music by Sibelius for a broadcast of the Belgian radio. This is perhaps an indirect consequence of the correspondence between Richard De Guide, programmer for the Belgian radio and the musicologist Ernest Closson. The latter had published an article in 1940 on Finnish music. De Guide wrote to Closson in response to his article, agreeing that Finnish music was still relatively unknown. But he pointed out that the Belgian radio broadcasted music of Finnish composers such as Sibelius and Kilpinen on a regular basis, and that the London-based Sibelius Society was producing a recording of Sibelius' music.

It is striking that concerts with Finnish music at the time were still presented as rare and exotic "Finnish evenings". This only diminishes from the 1990s, when programs mention the music and the composers without constantly referring to their Finnish origin. It illustrates that, nowadays, Finnish music is established in Belgian music life and that it has gained respect because of its musical value.

It is obvious that Finns are passionate about promoting music from their homeland. But this is not the only field of activity for which they should be credited. We have also been blessed with the presence in Brussels of excellent Finnish performers. Already in 1939, Aulikki Rautavaara sang the role of La Contessa in Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro in the Brussels opera house. It is mostly from the 1980s, though, that the stages of the Brussels Opera and the Palace for Fine Arts are regularly visited by Finnish performers such as the bass Jorma Silvasti, the baritone Jorma Hynninen, the sopranos Soile Isokoski and Karita Mattila and the conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen. This list is very incomplete, but it clearly illustrates the international circulation of Finnish musicians in which Belgium plays only a small part.

As artistic director of the National Orchestra of Belgium, Mikko Franck has played a prominent role in Brussels' musical life since 2002. Amongst other things, he conducted the first performance of Einojuhani Rautavaara's Book of Visions in 2005.

Two Finnish cultural weeks in Belgium were important in promoting Finnish music. The first week took place in 1954, the second one in 1984, celebrating the 20th and the 50th anniversary of the Finnish-Belgian Association respectively.
An important event in Brussels during the Finnish Week of 1954 was a concert in which Carlo Van Neste performed Sibelius' Violin Concerto with the National Orchestra of Belgium conducted by Tauno Hannikainen. Also, Daniel Sternefeld conducted the National Radio Orchestra performing music by Finnish composers such as Einar Englund, Yrjö Kilpinen, Uuno Klami and Jean Sibelius. Another important event was the performance in La Monnaie by the Finnish Ballet Company of the Helsinki Opera, with the ballet music Pessi ja Illusia by Ahti Sonninen (1914-1984). The Finnish Week of 1984 took place in Antwerp, Brussels and Liège and featured mainly choral and chamber music, performed by - amongst many others - the famous Sibelius Quartet, who gave concerts in those three locations.

The Brussels festival for new music Ars Musica regularly programmes Finnish music. In 1997, special attention was paid to the works of Magnus Lindberg. In the Ars Musica festivals, whether or not in collaboration with the Flanders Festival, three world premières of Finnish pieces took place: Asteria by Johan Tallgren in 1996, Aile du Songe by Kaija Saariaho in 2001, and Symphony No. 32 by Leif Segerstam in 2002.

Luckily, internationalisation is also felt in music education. In the 1970s, there were no more than two Finnish students at the Brussels Conservatories: the violinist Helena Lehtelä-Menander, student of Arthur Grumiaux, and the singer Tarja Hilesterä-Oksanen, student of Jules Bastin. From about 1995, a new generation of Finnish students found their way to the Brussels Conservatories: the violinist Johanna Nieminen, student at the Conservatoire Royal, the pianists Aïssa Bah and Jenni Lappalainen, the jazz singer Anu Junnonen and the jazz pianist Alexi Toumarila, students at the Koninklijk Conservatorium. There has also been international exchanges in masterclasses: Kamiel D'Hooghe, former director of the Koninklijk Conservatorium Brussel taught the Finnish organist Hakam Wikman in the frame of the Flor Peeters Masterclass in 1987. Finally, the European exchange programme Erasmus has also had a positive influence, facilitating the international exchange of students.

The Finnish presence extends to all fields of Brussels musical life. Therefore, it is not surprising to find Finnish names in the International Queen Elisabeth Music Competition of Belgium, both as contestants and as members of the jury. Especially from the 1990s, their appearances have become increasing. As members of the jury, we mention violinist Tuomas Haapanen, singer Tom Krause, composers Einojuhani Rautavaara and Kaija Saariaho; as finalist, we mention the pianist Laura Mikkola and the violinist Jaakko Kuusisto.

A fascinating aspect of mutual interaction can be found in the world of dance. For their production entitled "I said I", the Brussels-based dance group Rosas used the music of Petals by Kaija Saariaho. For the production "Just before", the music of Magnus Lindberg's Related Rocks was used. Lindberg also composed Counter phrases, commissioned by the Belgian Ictus Ensemble as film music for the movie with the same name.

At first sight, the Hungarian Miklós Spányi doesn't seem to fit in this storyline, but he teaches at the conservatory of Oulu in Finland. In 2000, he received a scholarship from the Finnish National Council of Music. His field of expertise is the keyboard music of Carl Phillip Emmanuel Bach (1714-1788), both as a musicologist and as a performer. He was the first to record C.P.E. Bach's complete keyboard music, including the concertos, on compact disc. In preparing this recording, he had regular contact with the library of the Brussels Conservatory, where many valuable sources are kept. In 2001, he gave a masterclass about the interpretation of C.P.E. Bach's music. Spányi often performs on Belgian instruments: tangent pianos built by Ghislain Potvlieghe, and clavichords built by Joris Potvlieghe.

The musical exchange between both countries is mutual. Finns have found the way to discover Brussels, but also vice versa. This last tradition can be traced back to the nineteenth century. Performers such as the violinists Henri Vieuxtemps (1820-1881), Mathieu Crickboom (1871-1947) and Eugène Ysaÿe (1858-1931), the cellist Adrien Servais (1807-1866), the pianist Arthur De Greef (1862-1940) and the soprano Désirée Artot (1835-1907) were very often invited to perform in Finland. On Finnish concert programmes, we also find the names of musicians who did not have the Belgian nationality, but who were for some time teachers at the Royal Conservatory in Brussels, such as the violinists Henryk Wieniawski and Jenö Hubay. The Brussels string quartet, formed by Franz Schörg, Hans Daucher, Paul Miry and Jacques Gaillard, were regular guests in Helsinki: between 1902 and 1912, they travelled to Helsinki no less than seven times to give a total of nineteen concerts.

These concerts with Belgian musicians most often took place in Heslinki and contributed to the rich 19th century musical life in the city. Thanks to research done by Seija Lappalainen in the field of the concert organisation Suerahoune, we know that 19th century musical culture in Helsinki was very international. In the first half of the twentieth century, concert life turned back to national musicians, but from the second half of the century, there is a return to a more internationally oriented music life. After 1950, Belgian musicians become a regular presence in Finnish concert halls: violinists André Gertler and Igor Oistrakh, conductor Daniël Sternefeld, organist Bernard Foccroulle, the Danel Quartet, recorder players Frédéric de Roos and Patrick Denecker, viola da gamba player Philippe Pierlot, harpsichordist Guy Penson and clarinetist Ronald Van Spaendonck.

One question remains unanswered: why is Finland, a country with less than six million inhabitants, so strongly represented in the music world? Many factors can point towards the answer, but certainly the quality of music education in Finland plays a crucial role. Young talented musicians are given many facilities and are efficiently supported until the end of their musical development.

This overview sketches out no more than an impression of the growing musical bonds between Finland and Brussels. We hope that this exhibition may inspire others to research further into the subject and, even more, that these bonds may serve as a stimulus to find new ways of expression in art and music.

Johan Eeckeloo
translation Helen Casano, Jan Moeyaert