REVIEW: Nordic Composers Shine Brightly in SummerFest’s ’Northern Lights’ Program

On the opening weekend of La Jolla SummerFest, Music Director Inon Barnatan focused on New York composers. Last Saturday celebrated the Piano Etudes of the august Philip Glass, and Sunday featured chamber music by a cadre of younger composers, Timo Andres, Patrick Castillo, and Matthew Aucoin.

On Friday, Barnatan turned the spotlight on a trio of Scandinavian composers: Carl Nielsen, Jean Sibelius, and Olli Mustonen. Music lovers who appreciate orchestral music know and laud Neilsen and Sibelius for their grand Symphonies, but Nielsen’s String Quintet in G Minor and Sibelius’s String Quartet in D Minor are little known. It was rewarding to hear these composers’ work in the more intimate sphere of chamber music, and, indeed, Sibelius subtitled his String Quartet Voces intimae.

It proved particularly delightful to hear for a second time Mustonen’s Nonet No. 2 for nine strings, which was performed during the 2017 La Jolla SummerFest when Mustonen was in residence at the festival. The heart of his Nonet is the robust “Allegro impetuoso” movement propelled by long phrases made up of short, muscular iterations. Rather than paste the minimalist label on Mustonen, I think Philip Glass’s preferred description of “music with repetitive structures” is apt.

The urgency of the “Allegro impetuoso” is balanced by the quiet, introspective “Adagio” in which the warm middle voices—the violas and cellos—float a consoling gentle dotted-rhythm motif. The finale’s title “Vivacissimo” easily summarizes the movement: an avalanche of high-pitched, whirring moto perpetuo motifs that could brilliantly underscore a high-speed car-chase in the latest action film. I am certain the success of the ensemble’s riveting performance of the Nonet can be attributed in part to the leadership of first violinist Blake Pouliot.

Whatever image you may have of the stereotypical Nordic melancholy that comes from long, dark, cold winters, the opening movement of the Sibelius D Minor String Quartet easily captures with its wistful, yearning modal character that is first defined in the opening movement and then returns in the expansive, rhapsodic middle movement. The composer’s mettle breaks out in his three fast-paced movements: the bracing “Vivace,” the urgently insistent “Allegretto ma pesante,” and the flamboyant finale that evokes symphonic grandeur.

Kudos to violinists Stefan Jackiw and Liza Ferschtman for their beautifully matched silvery timbres that gracefully shaped the composer’s effulgent themes. I also appreciated cellist Clive Greensmith’s ardent but tastefully understated phrasing, and violist Jonathan Vinocour added depth to the quartet’s rich, compelling sonority.

If you think that Danes partake of Nordic melancholy, you probably have not visited Copenhagen, a bustling, effervescent urban scene. Nielsen’s String Quintet in G Major exudes that cheerful confidence, especially its opening “Allegro pastorale” and the dreamy “Romanze” that follows it. His “Allegro scherzando” sports playful exuberance, and his concluding “Allegro” suggests the setting of a carefree folksong, all robed in a rich, late Romantic harmonic mode that makes no special requirements on the listener.

The skilled Nielsen performers: violinists Blake Pouliot and Alan Gilbert; violists Kyle Armbrust and Shoji Sun, and cellist Kajsa William-Olsson.

This concert was presented by the La Jolla Music Society at La Jolla’s Conrad Prebys Performing Arts Center on August 1, 2025.