Festival Of Ideas - Aallotar: Women's Voices in Finnish acapella

Join Enkelit, hosted by York St John University's Centre for Language and Social Justice, as they explore the importance of women's voices in two collections of Finish folk poems.

In our musical talk, Enkelit will talk about the important role of women’s voices in the two collections of Finnish folk poems, the Kalevala and Kanteletar. We will sing some of the songs for you, and trace how they have made musical and cultural waves over time. As modern Finnish women composers continue to be inspired by these poems, generations of singers have had the chance to sing old and new songs that explore the fullness of women’s lived experiences. This gives women singers of this repertoire the unusual chance to bring our whole selves, body, mind and voice, to the process of choral singing, in a way that makes waves and reverberates through and beyond the singing group.

The strength of the Finnish acapella choral music tradition has strong roots in the Kalevala, the collection of epic folk poems compiled, edited and published in 1835 by Elias Lönnrot, and often referred to as the Finnish national epic. It was followed by a collection of hundreds of folk songs, the Kanteletar, often seen as the ‘sister’ to the Kalevala. Both of these works have made waves within Finnish culture and the arts since the 1800s. In our musical talk Allotar (translation: ‘spirit of the waves’ or ‘water nymph’), Enkelit (translation: ‘angels’) would like you to join us as we talk about the important role of women’s voices in Lönnrot's collection of these folk poems as well as in the content of them, sing some of the songs and trace those waves to modern times. Finnish women composers continue to be inspired by these epic but everyday poems, giving women such as us in Enkelit the opportunity to share songs of hope, defiance, despair and happiness that delve deeply into the fullness of women’s lived experiences. This then, despite the linguistic challenges, allows women singers of this repertoire the unusual chance to bring our whole selves, body, mind and voice, to the process of choral singing, in a way that makes waves and reverberates through and beyond the singing group.