“Tale about
Sampo” was rewarded as the best Finnish opera in 2017 in the first ever Aino
gala of the Finnish opera scene in the beginning of this year. The decision was
made by public voting. The first performance took place in Jalasjärvi and the
opera has been shown in various cities after that. Now it came also to Helsinki,
to the Helsinki Music Centre. When the opera was shown in my home town, of
course, I had to go and see it. The main story of the opera is from the Finnish
National epic “Kalevala” about the making of Sampo (=mythic machine that creates
all the riches of the world).
If I start
with the positive things, I have to say that it is always great, when a huge
group of people get together and do something. People of Jalasjärvi and its
surroundings had combined their forces to make this opera come true and you really
could sense their enthusiasm. Juuso Tammelin’s music was many-sided and there
were tones of jazz, modern music, movie music and more classical pieces
included. Jalas Chamber did well in playing the music, even though it cannot
have been the easiest task ever. Stage setting (Juuso Tammelin and group) and
costume design (Maarit Honkonen and group) were naturally rather homespun, but it
kind of suits this type of work and e.g. the drawing of a pike was rather cute.
But was this
the best Finnish opera in 2017? No way! Unfortunately the composer, librettist
and director of the opera - Juuso Tammelin – had tried to squeeze everything he
could think of into one work beginning from all musical styles (which as such
is not necessary always a bad decision) to all kinds of themes. In addition to
making of Sampo, there were comments on politics, Finnish sports fans etc. The
scene was filled with all possible characters: cross country skiers, a representative
of Finnish biggest trade union and chess pieces just to name a few. First of
all, this made the opera seem disorganised and secondly it stretched the length
of the opera to three hours and 40 minutes, which was far too long for such a
flimsy work. It is true that the opera had some good elements but unfortunately
they were lost in the general clutter.
When, in addition
to this, the sound system was second rate (sometimes you could hear the choir’s
lines, sometimes not) and the directing was fluttery, you felt compassion for
the performers. My twinkling stars
were Jenni Liikaoja as the mother of Joukahainen and the daughter of Pohjola
and Juha Pikkarainen as the blacksmith Ilmarinen. It was nice to follow them.
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