The only complete recorded survey of Rautavaara’s piano music: the sequel to Morta Grigaliūnaitė’s acclaimed collection of Bacewicz on Piano Classics.

In her own detailed booklet essay, introducing the piano output of Einojuhani Rautavaara, Morta Grigaliūnaitė remarks that it was the otherworldly mood of works such as the Cantus Arcticus which initially drew her to the Finnish composer’s music. ‘I was equally captivated by the strength of character and unreserved virtuosity of his compositions… Rautavaara’s music… never imposes or forces itself, [it] consistently hovers between our world and the realm of the unknown.’

Not least through the global success of Cantus Arcticus, his ‘concerto for birds and orchestra’, Rautavaara remains one of the most frequently performed Finnish composers to this day, but his piano music is underappreciated in comparison.

Even as his language embraced greater complexity, he took inspiration from Christian themes with a cycle of piano Icons (1955) followed by the First Piano Sonata (subtitled ‘Christ and the Fisherman’, from 1969), and then the Second Sonata (‘The Fire Sermon’, of 1970).

In the meantime, collections of Preludes and Etudes demonstrated Rautavaara’s talent for drawing on the Romantic vocabulary of piano literature while speaking in his own language, just as Messiaen had done in the Vingt Régards. The textures often shimmer and glitter, demanding high virtuosity from the pianist and rewarding listeners with evocative tone-pictures of water, fire and light.

Morta Grigaliūnaitė completes her survey with a solo-piano arrangement of Cantus Arcticus in its first recording: she remarks that the transcription by Peter Lönnqvist ‘challenges the pianist to not only engage with the utmost level of virtuosity, but also to embody the sensitivity that Rautavaara’s music requires.’

‘Nothing scares the brilliant Morta Grigaliūnaitė.’ – Diapason