Saariaho: Saarikoski Songs, Vista, Three Preludes – Sakari Oramo

World Premiere Recordings of three works by Kaija Saariaho (1952–2023) from soprano Anu Komsi, the BBC Symphony Orchestra and conductor Sakari Oramo. Vista (2019), an expansive orchestral landscape, was the composer’s final work for orchestra. During a drive down the scenic Interstate 5 highway to San Diego, Saariaho encountered an image that matched her exact feeling in that moment: signs indicating ‘Vista Points,’ exits to locations from where to enjoy a peaceful view on the coastline and the ocean. She devoted the following months to the creation of a work that would capture the opening of new, unexpected landscapes. Vista swarms with bittersweet visions of paths the composer never had the opportunity to explore.

The Saarikoski Songs (2021) is performed here by Anu Komsi, for whom they were originally written. In 2013, in response to Komsi’s invitation to create a short song on a text by a modern Finnish poet, Saariaho set a poem by Pentti Saarikoski (1937–1983), and over the years she expanded the project to multiple songs. The collection chosen by Saariaho displays an ecologic theme, as the poet contemplates the destruction of the forest in his neighborhood to give way to new apartment buildings. The five Saarikoski songs were originally composed for voice and piano and recorded by Anu Komsi. Just days after signing the final double bar of the orchestration in January 2021, Saariaho was diagnosed with the brain cancer that came to claim her life.

The Three Preludes (1981) is an early work for soprano and organ and the composer’s only setting of Biblical material. These three miniatures are expressionistic fragments rather than devotional hymns. The organ was the instrument that Kaija Saariaho played in her twenties and the new organ of the Helsinki Music Centre – on which Anu Komsi and Marzi Nyman recorded this work – was made possible through a generous donation from Kaija Saariaho.