Estonia

Waiting for me on my doormat when i returned from Vienna a few days ago was a new CD of music by the Estonian composer Age Veeroos. i’ve been doubly excited waiting for it to arrive, partly because i was honoured to be asked to write the liner notes for …

Despite being primarily a chamber music festival, the concerts at this year’s World New Music Days in the Faroe Islands devoted significant time to works involving electronics. Five of these were installations, of which two were noteworthy. One was Ringar í Vatni [Rings in Water] by Faroese musician Heðin Ziska …

Two of the events at this year’s Baltic & Estonian Music Days were especially memorable. The first was given by one of the finest choirs in the world, the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir. Conducted by Mai Simson in the somewhat simple, functional interior of Tartu’s otherwise imposing St Paul’s Church, …

The opening weekend of this year’s Baltic & Estonian Music Days featured the final concert of their annual Young Composer competition, now in its tenth year. It was encouraging to witness that most rare of phenomena: the genuinely best works being the ones receiving the awards. All of the music …

As i mentioned previously, this year’s combined Baltic & Estonian Music Days took place in the southern city of Tartu, due to it being one of the three 2024 European Capitals of Culture. To mark the occasion, Märt-Matis Lill composed an elaborate fanfare to herald the start of the festival, …

Three years ago, sitting down to watch the inaugural Baltic Music Days – an entirely online event, due to the ongoing effects of COVID – i regularly found myself wondering to what extent “Baltic music” was a phrase that held any particular meaning. i came away on that occasion feeling …

The COMMUTE festival, based at the Estonian Academy of Music & Theatre, takes its name from its three primary spheres of interest: COMposition, MUsic, TEchnology. i’ve mentioned previously the mixture of success and failure with regard to audiovisual works at this year’s COMMUTE, and this polarity reared its head on …

Back in the heady days when I was a composition undergrad, full of that unique youthful blend of enthusiasm and arrogance, I loved student concerts. Hardly surprising really, as they were my concerts, occasions when me and my friends would present the latest fruits of our wayward whims. Nothing changed …

As an accompaniment to my Dialogue with composer Tatjana Kozlova-Johannes, the following is an essay written for the Estonian journal Sirp, originally published in Estonian translation last year. When I first heard the music of Tatjana Kozlova-Johannes, its effect was almost too much to take. It was in 2017, during …

i’m thrilled to be presenting the latest instalment in my occasional series The Dialogues. On this occasion, i’m sitting down with Estonian composer Tatjana Kozlova-Johannes, whose music i’ve been marvelling at ever since first contact at the 2017 Estonian Music Days. We got together at my rented apartment in Tallinn’s …

Perhaps the most compelling example of the kind of disorientation that border states can engender came in the concert given by Polish ensemble Spółdzielnia Muzyczna, appropriately titled ‘The Borders of Identity’. Here, more than anywhere else during AFEKT 2023, was a concert where none of the five works on the …

Borders are places of confusion, uncertainty and, often, danger, and in this context concerts such as the ones previously discussed at AFEKT 2023 – where most works had strong similarities while one or two were markedly different – raised related questions. Is such similarity attractive and important because it suggests …

Perhaps there’s never been a more appropriate time for a music festival to take as its theme, “Border State”. Borders seem more prominent in world events than ever: we’ve seen them being viciously violated, vigorously reinforced, valiantly defended. Conflicts continue to rage, and the resultant feeling is one of separation …

Elis Hallik is probably the most interesting Estonian composer who, thus far, i haven’t written much about. During my annual trips to the Estonian Music Days in recent years, she has rarely been featured, so until recently, all i knew of her music were two chamber works, To Become A …

The most overwhelming event at this year’s Estonian Music Days festival was a concert at the Arvo Pärt Centre given by soprano Iris Oja, percussionists Vambola Krigul and Lauri Metsvahi, and Tammo Sumera on electronics. In some respects it feels difficult to write about this concert, as the scope, depth …

Despite the quantity of abstract music featured at this year’s Estonian Music Days, it wasn’t surprising – with the theme “soul” looming over the Tallinn part of the festival – that many composers avoided abstraction and sought to create more tangible, referential and / or emotionally-charged music. Indeed, this was …

Surely the most completely abstract music i heard at this year’s Estonian Music Days was Blue Moon Station by Latvian composer Alise Rancāne. The piece involved all six members of the Ensemble of the Estonian Electronic Music Society (EMA) huddled around a computer keyboard playing a video game projected on …

In previous accounts of my annual pilgrimage to Eesti Muusika Päevad, the Estonian Music Days, i’ve tended to remark on the festival’s insistence on a theme, usually in regard to how innocuous or irrelevant it seemed in relation to the actual concerts. This year, the Tallinn portion of the festival …

Despite being one of Estonia’s foremost composers, Ester Mägi‘s reputation is pretty negligible outside the borders of her native land. It’s a situation that, thus far, hasn’t changed since her death in 2021, at the age of 99. My own contact with her music, despite the extent to which i’ve …

For those of a Catholic persuasion, today is one of the days devoted to Mary in the liturgical calendar, so it’s as good a time as any to feature in my Advent Calendar a setting of Ave Maria by Estonian composer Tõnis Kaumann. A few years ago i explored Kaumann’s …