The festival will be opened by an international guest appearance of the highest calibre, when the Estonian Festival Orchestra, consisting of European musicians, will perform on Wednesday 31 August 2022, conducted by the renowned Estonian conductor Paavo Järvi.

In Lemminkäinen, Wagnerian eroticism meets music with an archaic folk character. Behind the exquisite orchestral sonorities of The Swan of Tuonela glide the sacred swans of Wagner’s operas. The rhythms and melodic roots of the music are, however, Finnish. Lemminkäinen was composed before Sibelius wrote his First Symphony. It can be seen as a cycle of symphonic poems but also, in a certain sense, as a symphony. Sibelius referred to the set as ‘Four Legends’.

In the Second Symphony we are taken on a journey from the innocent sunshine of the first movement, by way of dark struggles, to the triumphant, Romantic finale. Background influences include Sibelius’s trip to Italy and the figure of Don Juan. The whole symphony grows organically from the three notes heard at the beginning of the first movement.

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The Lahti Symphony Orchestra reserves the right to make changes to the programmes and timing of concerts if the restrictions required by the coronavirus infection situation.