Kaija Saariaho.
In Saturday’s (6/3) Washington Post, Tim Page writes, “Kaija Saariaho, a Finnish-born composer whose music won international acclaim for its combination of sonic complexity and ethereal lyricism, died June 2 at her home in Paris. She was 70. The cause was glioblastoma, an aggressive type of brain cancer … In a career that spanned four decades, Ms. Saariaho wrote a dozen lengthy works for orchestra (with and without electronics), copious amounts of chamber music and vocal works, and five full-length operas. Her last piece, a trumpet concerto titled ‘Hush,’ is scheduled to premiere in Helsinki in August…. Saariaho’s music was admired by professional musicians and was increasingly popular with the general public. She topped a 2019 BBC poll of 174 fellow composers who were asked about their most respected living colleague. Organizations such as the Berlin Philharmonic, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Lincoln Center and the Finnish National Opera commissioned works from her… Kaija Anneli Laakkonen was born in Helsinki on Oct. 14, 1952…. Kaija began playing the violin at 6 … She matriculated at the Sibelius Conservatory, where her fellow students included future conductors Esa-Pekka Salonen and Jukka-Pekka Saraste and the composer Magnus Lindberg…. She moved to Paris in 1982, where she enrolled in IRCAM, a center for the study of acoustics, electronics and computer technology … There, she met Jean-Baptiste Barrière, a composer and faculty member whom she married in 1984…. In addition to her husband, she is survived by their two children, writer-director Aleksi Barrière and violinist-conductor Aliisa Neige Barrière.”
