Ollila

The Second Concerto proves an expressive and undeservedly neglected gem in Kantorow's hands.

As well known as the music itself is, the full background to Finlandia, the great symphonic poem composed by Finn Jean Sibelius, was unfamiliar to me until very recently. It turns out that Finlandia was originally part of a larger work that Sibelius composed in 1899 with the rather unartistic title "Press Celebrations Music". The seventh movement of that work, "Tableau 6, Suomi herää (Finland Awakes)", was later reworked into a stand-alone piece and became known as Finlandia, and this is how we have generally heard it performed since that time. It has become recognized as one of the most important national songs of Finland, but it is not the national anthem, that is Maamme ("Our Land").

The Swiss cellist Christian Poltéra here performs works by Frank Martin, Arthur Honegger and Othmar Schoeck. This follows a series of discs from Poltéra that were dedicated to these three composers. His disc of Frank Martin’s music (BISCD1637) was a Gramophone Editor’s Choice.