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It is finally time for Erkki Melartin to emerge from “the shadow of Sibelius”, nearly 63 years after his death. Is Melartin a symphonic composer of international stature or merely one of those “harlots and their pimps”, as Gustav Mahler termed the “national geniuses” in music?

A superficial reason for the opera boom may be the composers' wish to celebrate the new millennium with a work of opera, the king of music genres. However, the boom also speaks of the current good financial situation, for operas are expensive, as is well known. Opera has also spread beyond the stages of the established institutions such as the Finnish National Opera, and small ensembles are trying their wings.

The following article was published in an anthology of Ernest Pingoud’s writings collectively entitled “The Progress of Art” (Taiteen edistys), edited by Kalevi Aho in 1995. The articles had been translated from German, Russian and Swedish manuscripts by Seppo Heikinheimo. The essay “Musical Progress” appeared in the Montagsblatt der St. Petersburger Zeitung (Monday supplement of the St Petersburger newspaper) on April 18, 1911.

The founding of the city of St. Petersburg in 1703 meant the birth of a new orientation, a source of innovative ideas and of growth potential for the Finns. Building materials and labour were imported for the new metropolis from neighbouring Finland right from the early stages, and many of the city's bridges and palaces rest on Finnish granite.

The Russian-born composer Ernest Pingoud (1887–1942) emigrated to Finland to escape the revolution in 1918 and spent most of his working life there. He became one of the champions of musical modernism in Finland at its height in the 1920s, together with Väinö Raitio and Aarre Merikanto.

Finland prides itself on being an exemplary country as regards its music education. Foreigners sigh with envy on hearing about our unique music institute system covering all levels from babies right up to PhD students and beyond. And although the music institutes nowadays receive considerable public funding, not one of them was founded by an order from on high; they have just sprung up in response to public demand wherever sufficient material resources have been forthcoming.

Finnish cinema is enjoying a major boom: the higher degree of professionalism and the growing rate of new releases are paying dividends in bigger box-office figures. In the process, music is regaining its status as part of the total experience, and the severed link between directors and composers is being restored again.

Finnish arts policy attracts attention and interest internationally because of its remarkable results. Per capita, Finland has produced an astounding number of world-class conductors, composers and instrumentalists. Why is this? What is the secret behind this success?

"You are born with a dramatic pulse, with dramatic thinking, and that's that. I've written now about two-thirds, so I call it a marathon," says composer Aulis Sallinen, whose new opera King Lear will be premiered at the Finnish National Opera on 15 September, 2000.