The Princess of Cyprus

"this CD is useful to have, especially given the decent (though not flawless) playing, fine recording and helpful documentation."
(Gramophone)

When BIS released the rarely performed opera Loreley (BIS-CD-1393/94), by 'the father of Finnish music' Fredrik Pacius the response was gratifying. Classical Music Web congratulated 'all those involved, in rescuing from oblivion a work that never deserved such a fate' and the critic in BBC Music Magazine found 'moments of real wonder … in this deftly structured period-piece' Loreley was, as might be expected from the title, a retelling (in German) of the famous story of ill-fated love in the Rhine valley, and to some extent a return of the elderly composer to his German roots. The Princess of Cyprus, presented here for the first time on disc, is a much earlier work and belongs to the first wave of Finnish art inspired by the Kalevala, the epic poem which has had such an influence on the cultural life of Finland ever since it was first compiled in 1835. It was Zacharias Topelius who wrote the play (in Swedish) to which Pacius composed his music, and in spite of Cyprus being the setting for part of this 'musical play', it is actually a re-telling of the love-story between two of the Kalevala's leading characters, Lemminkäinen and Kyllikki. The concept of a German-born composer writing the music for a play in Swedish on Finnish themes set in Cyprus is bewildering to say the least. A further complication was that even though Pacius had hoped to create something speci?cally Finnish, at Topelius's request he composed in a lighter vein. Interspersed with the spoken dialogue Pacius wrote a dozen or so musical numbers scored for soloists, chorus and orchestra. In addition to these there are two spoken episodes accompanied by music. The music is in the Romantic style of Central Europe spiced with a pinch or two of Finnish seasoning, such as the occasional appearance of quintuple-time typical of the Kalevala poems.

First performed in 1860, The Princess of Cyprus had been long forgotten when Ulf Söderblom - a veteran among Finnish opera conductors, and previously represented on BIS in recordings of music by Joonas Kokkonen and Mikko Heiniö - prepared the score for a concert revival in 2001. In the version recorded here the spoken dialogue has been reduced to a text written by the poet Lars Huldén for a single narrator. The result is a fascinating and tuneful testimony of its time as well as to the development taking place in every country searching for its roots in the mid-1800s, lovingly adapted and recreated by Ulf Söderblom and Tapiola Sinfonietta, with the help of a number of leading Finnish singers and actors. The CD is packaged in an attractive slipcase, with artworks related to the period and subject-matter, and with a separate booklet giving the full libretto in the original Swedish, with English and Finnish translations, and with liner notes in four languages.