Jouni Kaipainen (b. 1956) is one of the finest amongst the younger generations of Finnish composers. His music characteristically displays an engaging and remarkable fusion...

Jouni Kaipainen (b. 1956) is one of the finest amongst the younger generations of Finnish composers. His music characteristically displays an engaging and remarkable fusion of diatonicism within a sound-world of serial complexity reflecting the impact of the two principal mentors from his youth: Aulis Sallinen and Paavo Heininen. But Kaipainen has steadily developed away from both of them to forge his own style. This can be heard already in his First Symphony (1980-85) and Clarinet Concerto, Carpe diem! (1990). The single-span structure of Symphony No. 1 retained remarkable spontaneity despite taking six years to perfect. Its successor, outwardly more conventional in three movements, had less protracted birth pangs and is an even more impressive achievement, perhaps the finest Finnish symphony since Rautavaara’s Fifth (1986). Admirers of Sibelius’s architectonic instinct will find much to like here, even if at times Kaipainen sounds rather closer in spirit to Karl Amadeus Hartmann.

The other two pieces also date from 1994. Sisyphus Dreams is basically a tone-poem, alternating black moods with hopeful quietude. The splendid Oboe Concerto is outwardly of a lighter disposition than the symphony but highly virtuosic, delivered with breathtaking aplomb by its dedicatee, Helen Jahren. When in Finland last November I heard some very indifferent playing (in the Sibelius Violin Concerto) from the Finnish Radio orchestra under Sakari Oramo; their playing in all three items here is of a much higher order. Very strongly recommended.

-- Gramophone [3/1996]