Tapiola Sinfonietta and Tuuli Takala in the Tapiola Hall, the 5th of April, 2019

A concert by Tapiola Sinfonietta with Tuuli Takala was a great start for a weekend! The concert began with the miniature balet  “The Creation of the World” from 1924. The music had exciting jazz-style features and I liked it a lot.

The absolute highlight of the evening was, however, Tuuli Takala, who sang Claude Debussy’s “Ariettes oubliées” -songs from the collection “C’est l’extase” and the song “La mer est plus belle” from the collection “Trois melodies”. The songs were based on Paul Verlaine’s poems and the orchestration was made by Robin Holloway.

I became a fan of Tuuli Takala a few years ago, when she sang the role of the Queen of the Night in the Finnish National Opera’s “The Magic Flute”. The Debussy songs were totally different from the Queen of the Night music, but her virtuosity in them was unbelievable. The beauty of Takala’s voice and her superb technique alone made an impression, but the stellar performance raises her among international stars. Even if you hadn’t read the poems from the programme leaflet or could not see the texting behind her on the wall, the atmosphere created by the poems was easily heard in Takala’s voice.

I perhaps liked the best the poem “Aquarelles II. Spleen”, but Takalas’s performance was so incredible that all the songs sounded great and interesting. The song “Paysages belges. Chevaux de bois” sounded perkier than the other – more emotional – songs. It was really exciting to see, how it brought out in Takala a certain air of panache. Such a professional!

The last number of Tapiola Sinfonietta was Franz Schubert’s 9^th symphony (Great C Major), which is often claimed to be a work of transition between classicism and romanticism. And I have to say that there were various musical styles to be heard in the symphony. I thought during the symphony several times that this brings to my mind this and that. For some reason I was hearing connections to Russian music (e.g. to Tchaikovsky). I cannot say that I am that knowledgeable in classical music that I could swear this was true, but my ears were picking up similarities. A great work anyway!

The conductor of the evening was Mario Venzago. Venzago conducted the works energetically and the musicians of Tapiola Sinfonietta could show their best talents. I have to say that Venzano made a lasting impression on me also because he gave me the flowers he got at the end of the concert! What a gentleman!

Tuuli Takala

The Venzano Flowers