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Rock star, bohemian, busker, creative genius, contemporary composer, pop singer, session player. Our images of music and musicians are easily associated with images of money and wealth, or the absence of same. Some of these people seem to be filthy rich, while others do not have two pennies to rub together – or simply do not care.

Music, too, can be used for malevolent purposes, as Arttu Tolonen reflects in his column.

"Apart from the three cellists, Perez and drummer Mikko Sirén, the hidden hero of the album is producer Nick Raskulinecz, who has made Apocalyptica sound punchier and more colourful than ever before."

"The Kalevala, which has since been translated into 61 languages, has harnessed this metre into something particularly Finnish, as well as stifling it into a literary form over the course of time. Every single Finn has sat at school bored stupid while reading a book that was meant to be sung. Even so, Kalevalaic runo singing metre is still alive in our culture – it can even be found in today’s singing. At least in contemporary folk music."

Dancing and music used to be joined at the hip. In folk music, this symbiotic relationship was preserved for a long time due to the fact that the bulk of traditional music is actually dance music. Today the connections between these two art forms are being examined at the Sibelius Academy Folk Music Department and through the many and varied projects of the Tsuumi Dance Theatre.

"The slow rise in online sales has not been altogether a bad thing for the producers of art-music CDs, because the turnover in these exceeds that of digital services. The trend is clear, however, and the markets are becoming increasingly competitive. How, then, will the sound-carrier markets for art music survive in the digital future? There are two obvious answers..."

Being a freelance composer is much like being an entrepreneur – for one thing, your career development is entirely in your own hands. “You cannot wait and expect someone else to do it for you,” says composer Sebastian Hilli.

"Everything would seem to have been simpler 30 years ago when the FMQ was launched. No one had ever even dreamt of an octopus-like internet, and social media was unknown; the printed word was solemn and reliable, and the mainstream media was in a sovereign position to decide what was in the news and what was not. Its authority was absolute: the editorial boards even determined which readers’ comments they would publish and which they would not."

“Without an artist grant, I would not be able to work as intensely as I do. I am very grateful for the existence of this system and for being admitted into it. This has enabled me to do my own thing, and I am trying to use my time as well as I possibly can,” says trumpet player Verneri Pohjola, who released his new album this spring.