The autumn season kicks off on 16 September, when Avanti! quartet goes on tour with the Red Nose Company. The Red Nose Company’s co-production Aleksis Kivi, which premiered at the National Theatre in spring 2022, will tour to Finnish theatres and will have its first premiere on 16 September at the Turku City Theatre. During the autumn, the tour will be seen in Turku, Tampere, Lahti and Jyväskylä City Theatres.
The AUF collaboration with the UMO Helsinki Jazz Orchestra and the Finnish Baroque Orchestra (FiBO), which has been ongoing since 2017, will continue this autumn. This time the orchestras will be joined by Rajattoman, who is celebrating its 25th anniversary. In a concert at the Music Hall on 20 September, the new and old musical worlds will meet in London, the homeland and New York. The concert’s moods range from intimate and delicate moments to uproarious communal music-making.
The children’s concert series Touch the Music, which started at Suvisoito in Porvoo, now continues in Helsinki. Long-time audience engagement professional Tuula Jukola-Nuorteva, visual artist Liisa Ikävalko and Avant’s musicians bring music within touching distance. During the autumn, children will be able to paint and feel the music while Avant’s musicians create an atmosphere with their music. The first musical painting session will take place on 2 October in the Ahti Sonninen Hall of the Music Academy of Eastern Finland. Admission is free, but advance registration is requested via our website. The concert series will continue in November. Information about the concerts will be updated on the Avant website.
Kaija Saariaho turns 70 this year and Avanti! will be present at the birthday party. 15.10. A gala concert will be held in the Music Hall, the first part of which will feature pieces by Saariaho and young composers performed by the Zagros Ensemble. In the second half of the concert, Avanti!, conducted by Aliisa Neige Barriere, will perform Saariaho’s Aile du Songe with Kaisa Kortelainen as soloist, Graal Theatre’s John Storgårds as soloist and Leevi Räsäsä’s new work Don´t tell Mama. The year culminates with the Finnish premiere of Saariaho’s La Passion de Simone, when Avanti! and the Paris-based musical theatre group La Chambre aux echos join forces. The work will be conducted by Saariaho specialist Clement Mao-Takacs and directed by Aleksi Barriere. For composer Kaija Saariaho, the Passion is her most personal and therefore most important stage work. The work will be performed twice at Musiikkitalo on 29 and 30 December.
The autumn will also include a festival atmosphere to the tune of Avant. The closing concert of the Sipoon Voices Festival on Sunday 9 October will feature Petri Kumela as guitar soloist. The concert will be conducted by József Hárs. The programme includes George Crumb’s Dream Sequence, Louise Farrenc’s Nonetto in E flat major, Op. 38 and Antti Auvinen’s Andalusian Panzerwagen Jazz. The concert concludes with Richard Wagner’s Siegfrieds Tod und Trauermarsch, arranged by Emil Holmström.
On 8 November, an Avant concert will take place in the Cable Factory’s Sea Cable Hall, with a programme based around environmental protection themes. In addition to music, the concert will feature talks by Mikael Fortelius, Professor Emeritus of Evolutionary Palaeontology at the University of Helsinki, and Hannele Korhose, Research Professor at the Finnish Meteorological Institute.
