LPO: Voices from Finland – Southbank Centre, London

Composers: Lotta Wennäkoska and Jean Sibelius

Conductor: Robin Ticciati

Voices from Finland, performed by the LPO under the baton of Robin Ticciati, is an imaginatively curated programme. Fresh light is cast on Sibelius’s choral symphony, Kullervo, by a new work, Zelo, by young Finnish composer, Lotta Wennäkoska, specially commissioned by the LPO and receiving its world premiere at this performance.

Sibelius’s symphonic work taps deeply into the great national epic of Finnish literature, Kalevala. Compiled in the nineteenth century from Finnish folklore and mythology, it celebrates the Finnish nation and its unique language. Kullervo is Sibelius’s setting of five episodes in the life of one of its central characters, the eponymous tragic hero. Having unwittingly seduced his own sister, he seeks redemption on the battlefield, but still guilt-ridden, he returns to the scene of his crime and falls on his sword. The work first premiered in Helsinki in April 1892, and its use of the Finnish language, key elements of Finnish folk song, and rhythms, celebrated the country’s struggle for independence from Imperial Russia.

Lotta Wennäkoski writes in the programme notes of her love of Sibelius’s music and her particular attraction to Kullervo. She sees Kullervo himself as an ‘endlessly inconsolable and lonely figure, who has been mistreated from the very beginning of his life.’ Yet Wennäkoski’s work has a lightness and joy to it, particularly in the first and second movements, Introduction and Cradling, where her orchestration celebrates youthfulness. Plucked strings suggest leaping energy, the harp, xylophone and triangle create a sense of the magic of the natural world, and poignant melodies for the flute give tantalising snatches of folk tunes.

Zelo itself, she explains, is the Italian for ‘zeal’ or ‘enthusiasm’, and Wennäkowski uses it as the title of the third movement where a wide range of percussion instruments give additional colour and vibrancy. In the fourth movement, Lamento (del vento), she evokes war through loud percussive notes, clashing cymbals and spine-tingling blasts from the brass section. The piece ends with the Epilogue, which she designed to be brighter than Sibelius’s.

For, of course, Wennäkowski has drawn imaginatively on Kullervo. Zelo too is in five movements, and, while echoing part of Sibelius’s orchestration – flute and piccolo are key to storytelling in both – she adds a variety of intriguing flavours. The harp, for example, evokes folk songs without drawing directly from them. Then there is the gentle beating of drumsticks on exposed piano strings in contrast to strange scratchy sounds created by other percussion instruments.

Zelo is a delightful piece, and it is a pleasure to see the composer herself bound up on stage to greet Robin Ticciati at the end.

In the second half, the LPO performs Kullervo itself. Newly attuned to both the tragic story and the distinctive flavour of Finnish music, the piece shines brightly. The two soloists, soprano Miina-Liisa Värelä and bass-baritone Shenyang, perform magnificently and are strongly supported by Finland’s oldest Finnish-language choir, the YL Male Voice Choir. Again, the hero’s youthful vigour is suggested at the start and wind instruments poignantly delineate the tragic love story. Sibelius draws on the particular quality of chanted folk songs, the choir repeating over and over the enigmatic phrase, ‘Kullervo, son of Kalervo/ With the very bluest of stockings’. Martial sounds begin gently with the piccolo, but all too soon trumpets, trombones, horns and tuba dramatise Kullervo’s violence and drive towards death.

The evident commitment of conductor, Ticciati, the players of the LPO, the two soloists and the YL Male Voice Choir shine bright throughout the evening, to an unforgettable experience.

Reviewed on 25 March 2026