The ballet pantomime “Scaramouche” by Jean Sibelius (Op. 71, 1913 is a forgotten treasure of the master composer. The new version of the piece combines the colourful phases of Sibelius’ life to his ingenious incidental music. The music drama will be visualized by cinematic elements. The sources of inspiration for the story are letter correspondence between Jean and Aino Sibelius, and the diary entries of Sibelius. The artistic process of creation is at the center of the story.
The music of Scaramouche will be played by the Tapiola Sinfonietta and conductor Tuomas Hannikainen. The performance is a part of the doctorate prepared by Hannikainen for the Sibelius Academy, the subject of which is the incidental music of Sibelius. “As a conductor who is interested in music dramas, I consider Scaramouche to be a uniquely interesting music piece that opens possibilities of realization between different fields of art. The goal is to achieve an organic, dynamic unity of the music and the image. The visualization paints a symbolistic and dream-like scenery of soul that moves in the counter-currents of realism and subconscious”, Hannikainen states.
The film planning is by the working group Tuomas Hannikainen, Marikki Hakola, Raimo Uunila and Lauri Danska. The producer of visualization is Kroma Productions Ltd. The realization of the visualization has been supported by the National Council for Music of the Arts Promotion Centre Finland, the Ministry of Education and Culture, and Tapiola Sinfonietta. Scaramouche is a part of the program of the 2015 Sibelius 150 years Jubilee.
Tuomas Hannikainen’s writing “Scaramouche by Sibelius”
