Rock Painting / Värikallio UUCD103 Price / Hinta 15€ Tämä sivu on vain englanninkielisenä! Buy this record from / Näistä kaupoista       Rock Painting, Uusinta's second studio album was released on 22nd of February 2006. The album contains seven compositions by Osmo Tapio Räihälä. The following works made their way to the record: Rampant Damballa String Quartet nr. 2 "Jobimao" King of Lycksele Stoa Trilogy Emperor of Vuokki Rock Painting Rampant (Reeta Maalismaa and Maria Puusaari, violin) Rampant is one of my Everton-inspired compositions. The title comes from the BBC commentator John Motson’s enthusiastic shout “It’s a rampant Everton now!” during a game against Watford in 1985. For some reason I connected the word ‘rampant’ with the idea of quick and explosive music that I was going to write for two solo violins. The plan to write for two violins started in 1996. I was in a hotel room in Copenhagen, where the violinist and composer Jaakko Kuusisto was doing some practising. He introduced to me something that he called ‘fart tones’ – with a very slow bow and high pressure on the g string, it is possible to achieve a sounding tone of one octave or a minor seventh lower than the written note. This brings a strong and buzzing sound. I wanted to use these tones in my work, but in the end they play only a small role in the middle of the piece because they are very difficult to control. Two violins for this composition was Jaakko’s proposal; he needed some repertoire to play with his brother Pekka who, like Jaakko, is a brilliant musician. Rampant was finished in the autumn 1997 and was premiered by the Kuusisto brothers in the 1998 Tuusulanjärvi Music Festival. Damballa Listen to a sound clip! (Lauri Toivio, flute, Riikka Talvitie, oboe, Kimmo Leppälä, clarinet, Maria Puusaari, violin) Damballa was specially written for the Uusinta players Lauri Toivio, Riikka Talvitie, Kimmo Leppälä and Maria Puusaari in 2000. It was heard for the first time at Viitasaari's Time of Music Festival in July 2000 and was immediately well received. This piece lasts just under eight minutes and the oboe has a notable role, although it features only after more than two minutes has passed. Damballa was performed three times during the Musica nova festival in Helsinki in March 2003 and received rave reviews in the press. It has become something of a tour de force of the composer. Damballa was even heard in Dublin, Republic of Ireland, in June 2002, and in Rottenburg, Germany in April 2005. String Quartet nr. 2 "Jobimao" (Uusinta String Quartet) String Quartet nr. 2, subtitled Jobimao, was a hasty affair in the autumn of the year 2000. I was about to write a string quartet for a concert of my compositions only, and when I started the work there were just a couple of weeks left. I wrote an epilogue in the fashion of the Brazilian bossa nova king Antonio Carlos Jobim, and took this fully tonal material and broadened it into a more modern-sounding beginning. Together these two make Jobimao into an airy and light-hearted piece of music, pointing out that not all music seek to reach the same depth as Beethoven. I finished the work just in time for the premiere, which was a part of the Järvenpää Sibelius Week in that same year 2000. King of Lycksele (Markus Hohti, cello) King of Lycksele is a brief ride with solo cello, written for Markus Hohti in late 2002. Markus wanted to have a short work that would not be too serious or self-assertive contemporary music. This led me to write an etude, that took its title from an inside-joke between me and the composer Markus Fagerudd, who also wrote a piece for Markus Hohti for the same purpose. The first performance was heard in April 2003 in Pieksämäki, Finland. Stoa Trilogy (Maria Puusaari, violin, Emil Holmström, piano) I started Stoa Trilogy in early 2002. In this work, I sought the spirit of the ancient Stoic school and its perception of how a man can achieve the balance with the world through three moods. The first movement is thus called Ataraxy. It seeks a total peace of mind where no outward stimulus can affect a human being. The second, Apathy, follows in the same concept and in the last movement, Autarchy, the music describes total selfassurance. The titles are not to be taken strictly as programmatic, and I for one am not a member of the Stoics. Confessing this gave way to a tiny little quotation of an early 1980’s rock group Hassisen kone tune in the end of the composition. Stoa Trilogy was premiered in another concert of my works in Helsinki in November 2002 and is dedicated to Maria Puusaari. Emperor of Vuokki (Maria Puusaari, violin) Emperor of Vuokki is another short composition for a solo string instrument, this time for violin. It is a sister work for King of Lycksele, and it does not require a rocket scientist to find out that these pieces share a common nature. I wrote this composition during one single day in the spring of 2004. As usual, I made some changes later, most of them by advice of the violinist Maria Puusaari, who also premiered the work in November 2004 in Helsinki. The title is another inside-joke: during his working career, my late father had such an impact in the Vuokki area in Suomussalmi, northern Finland, that he got the nickname the Emperor of Vuokki. Only few years ago I realized who, as the oldest son, is the natural heir to his “throne”… Rock Painting (Eva Ollikainen, conductor, Lauri Toivio, flute, Anni Haapaniemi, oboe, Marko Portin, clarinet, Janne Pulkkinen, bassoon, Reeta Rossi, horn, Emil Holmström, piano, Maria Puusaari and Mirka Malmi, violin, Max Savikangas, viola, Markus Hohti, cello, Henrika Fagerlund, double bass) Rock Painting for chamber ensemble marks a clear change in my style. It is a conclusion of the influence that I have got from both historical and contemporary art music as well as progressive rock and jazz. I wrote this work for the fifth anniversary concert of the Uusinta Chamber Ensemble in late 2003. It was premiered in January 2004 under the baton of Eva Ollikainen. The title has a double meaning: of course it points out to rock music, but at the same time, it refers to the Rock Painting in Hossa, Suomussalmi. This painting of 61 figures – mostly men and moose – was done around 2000-2500 B.C. and was rediscovered in 1977. This group of paintings represents to me the roots of Finns in general, and as my own music roots lie deeply in rock music, the title is quite an obvious choice. The three solos in the work are improvised by the flutist Lauri Toivio, the violist Max Savikangas and the clarinettist Marko Portin. I let them express their own style, and was glad to notice that Jethro Tull, Frank Zappa or Benny Goodman have not passed these gentlemen without leaving some ‘rock paintings’ on their souls either. (Program notes © 2006 Osmo Tapio Räihälä) Copyright 2000-06 Uusinta Publishing Company Ltd.