The Sounds of Luosto festival, which opened to rave reviews and full concerts in 2021 after corona cancellations the previous year, returns in 2022 for a festival focused on Stories and Myths. Over 5 days, the festival will feature 16 performances in venues throughout beautiful central Finnish Lapland, including numerous multidisciplinary performances combining artforms such as painting, oration, fine arts, and culinary delights with performances of classical music.
The Sounds of Luosto brings top classical talent from all over the world to Luosto, with established names and rising stars from as far as Malaysia and as close as Rovaniemi. A core group of artists provide chamber music and solo performance throughout the week, with three ensembles—the 100-year-old Polytech Orchestra, locally beloved Seitakuoro choir, and acclaimed Helsinki Chamber Orchestra—performing larger ensemble concerts.
The two orchestra both welcome soloists with impressive international resumes. The mezzosoprano Virpi Räisänen will perform Outi Tarkiainen’s Eanan, gida nieda, the first notated Sami language song cycle, with the Helsinki Chamber Orchestra, while pianist Martin Malmgren will join the Polytech Orchestra in the Rachmaninoff Second Piano Concerto.
These larger ensembles will perform at two unique outdoor amphitheaters which celebrate the remarkable beauty of the surrounding nature. Seitakuoro will perform on the Aittakuru stage, built directly into a Lappish fell-gorge with the audience high up above the stage on the mountainside. The two orchestras will perform on the Ukko-Luosto stage, built in such a way that it takes its acoustic entirely from the Luosto fell. Specifically the Ukko-Luosto stage has been praised as acoustically unique in the world, as well as the “only stage in the world where audiences can pick blueberries while listening to a concert” by composer Kalevi Aho. Other interesting performance venues include the 330-year-old wooden church in the Heart of Sodankylä.
Unique multidisciplinary performances at Kakslauttanen Arctic Resort
For the first time, the Sounds of Luosto festival will expand beyond Luosto, Pyhä, and Sodankylä, with a day-long visit to the incredible Kakslauttanen Arctic Resort.
The visit will begin with Down the River, a multidisciplinary performance which takes the audience on a physical journey through the stunning architecture and art displays of the Kakslauttanen West Village. The performance begins with a visit to Kakslauttanen’s brand-new Planetarium, the largest such space in Finland. There, the audience will have the opportunity to view a presentation, produced by the Kakslauttanen Resort, studying the mythology and science of the Northern Lights.
From there, the performance tracks the course of a mythological river, flowing from the sky and the world of the gods, down to the underworld and the world of the dead, and back up to the world of the living. Permanent pieces in the resort’s art collection, including Sulo Norberg’s Midnight Sun and Kirsi Kaulanen’s Underground Northern Lights feature heavily in this journey, with four different musical performances, each situated in such a way to contribute to this river-narrative, pull the audience through the venue in an organic way.
After an opportunity for audiences to dine in a local restaurant, the evening continues with Songs from the Underworld, a more traditional concert celebrating works that handle death and dying. Located in the hall of the Kakslauttanen resort, different ensembles will perform works including Anna Clyne’s Rest These Hands and Schubert immortal Death and the Maiden quartet. Travel to and from the Resort is included in the price of a day pass for these concerts.
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For more information, visit luostosoi.fi/eng or email artistic director Aku Sorensen at sorensen.aku@gmail.com