Living Water

Mirkka Rekola (FN)

“Living Water (‘Elävää vettä’) is a song cycle composed to four poems by Mirkka Rekola. I wrote the work for the soprano Olga Heikkilä to have its world premiere at my coming profile concert in Helsinki on 28th September 2024.
Although my passion for classical music was originally ignited by Schubert’s and Schumann’s lieder, I have only ever composed songs with piano accompaniment as a form of practice, with the results consigned to the drawer. The combination of singer and piano has always felt exhausted to me, and it took me a long time to find a way around this challenge. This is why my catalogue contains few songs.
My approach to vocal music changed when I began treating it as chamber music, where the singer is just one of the ensemble’s members. This concept is also reflected in the works Zen and Rajat (‘The Borders’), which are featured on my new album, Zensolence. In the former, the singer is accompanied by flute, clarinet, violin, and cello; in the latter, by French horn, violin, and piano. The ensemble for the Living Water cycle includes, alongside the soprano, a flute, violin, and cello. The four poems are interspersed with two instrumental interludes. The continuous work lasts approximately 15 minutes.
Mirkka Rekola (1931–2014) was long regarded as a ‘difficult’ poet, and indeed she was one of the leading Finnish-language modernists of her time. However, I don’t approach poetry merely as text; I experience it as music, visual art, and movement as well. Rekola's often enigmatic poems evoke in my mind scenarios that already contain music – it has simply been my task to write it out.” (Osmo Tapio Räihälä)