In February 2021, Kaija was diagnosed with a glioblastoma, an aggressive type of brain cancer, found from the onset to be uncurable and lethal. With characteristically strong determination, she fought daily to both slow its growth and live fully. The multiplying tumors did not affect her cognitive faculties until the terminal phase of her illness; they were located in the area controlling her motor skills on the right side of her body, which led to growing difficulties in walking and talking, in turn exacerbated by ensuing falls and broken bones. Kaija’s appearances in a wheelchair or walking with a cane have prompted many questions, to which she answered elusively: following her physician’s advice, she kept her illness a private matter, in order tomaintain a positive mindset and keep the focus on her work. Her case should however help raise awareness concerning the nature and detection of brain tumors. It should also highlight the plight of immunocompromised individuals: twice Kaija has contracted Covid in public events where insufficient measures were taken, if at all, to protect the most fragile among us. Her experience as a wheelchair user also made her more aware of the inadequacy of many locations she visited, including cultural venues. All of this she would now want publicized. She also hoped that, through the experimental treatment protocols she underwent at the Pitié-Salpêtrièrehospital in Paris, she could, on a small scale, help advance research on conditions such as hers.

Kaija, who was born in 1952 in Helsinki, Finland, died prematurely at the age of 70, but lived a full life. Her early trajectory brought her from the avant-garde music circles of Finland to the European stage between Freiburg, Darmstadt and Paris, giving her the opportunity to contribute to the golden age of computer music, and later integrate a new understanding of harmony and psychoacoustics into the tradition of modern orchestra and opera writing. She achieved universal recognition among her peers and both public and critical success, all while never ceasing to challenge herself to explore new directions.

During the time of her illness, Kaija had the joy of being surrounded by a close circle of faithful friends and collaborators, and even of expanding it. She was involved in many new productions of her music, and in the premiere performances of her latest works: the Saarikoski Songs, the chamber music piece Semafor, the orchestra work Vista, the madrigal Reconnaissance, the re-creation of her first music theatre piece Study for Life, and her acclaimed last opera Innocence. She also did not relent in her commitment to teaching and passing the torch. One of her last endeavors was to lead the jury of an organ composition contest she initiated for the inauguration of the Helsinki Music Centre’s new organ, an instrument she helped fund.

The final months of Kaija’s life were devoted to the completion of her trumpet concerto, HUSH, which will be premiered in Helsinki on August 24^th by Verneri Pohjola, with Susanna Mälkkiconducting the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra.

Kaija is survived by all of us who loved her and were blessed with her relentless generosity and insightful artistic support. But more importantly, we will all be survived by the bold, sensitive, exploratory music she has created, termed a classic of this century already in her lifetime.

Jean-Baptiste Barrière, composer and multimedia artist, her husband

Aleksi Barrière, writer and director, her son

Aliisa Neige Barrière, conductor and violinist, her daughter

October 2022 will see an exciting series of events across Finland in celebration of the composer’s 70th birthday, “Kaija Saariaho 70“.

“Kaija Saariaho 70” will see performances of numerous works by Kaija Saariaho, including stage works and world premieres.

For more information and to have the full list of events, please visit “Kaija Saariaho 70“.

Please watch here below the full Kaija Saariaho’s acceptance speech:

Innocence was jointly commissioned by the Festival International d’Art Lyrique d’Aix-en-Provence, Royal Opera House Covent Garden, Finnish National Opera, San Francisco Opera and Dutch National Opera. It was premiered on July 3, 2022, at Grand Théâtre de Provence, Aix en Provence with musical director Susanna Mälkki conducting and staged by the Australian theatre director Simon Stone.

It is a typical wedding for a cosmopolitan city, in present-day Finland. The fiancé is Finnish, the bride Romanian, and the mother-in-law French. But suddenly, during the wedding banquet, the Czech waitress feels ill… Ten years earlier, these characters were struck by a tragic event. Ghosts revive their memories of the trauma, which occurred in a school; there is a guilty haze, a lost innocence.

Innocence is the result of a meeting between Kaija Saariaho, Aleksi Barrière and Sofi Oksanen, who is unrivalled in her ability to force today’s reality to confront the past. Innocence — multiplot opera for soloists, chorus and orchestra — is a contemporary tragedy made radiant through its powerful music and the intermingling of words from different languages.

“Vista lives up to its name as a piece that reveals new horizons. The ever-unfolding world of Kaija Saariaho’s soundscape is rich and broad, and the orchestral palette is novel. It’s a tremendous honour and joy that Saariaho’s newest piece is written for us”, Susanna Mälkki says.

Vista world premiere will be streamed on May 12 at 7pm EEST, for more information please visit the Helsinki Philharmonic website.

Kaija Saariaho’s new orchestral work will also receive its German premiere by Berlin Philharmonic, conducted also by Susanna Mälkki on May 22. The performance will be streamed via the orchestra’s Digital Concert Hall.

Blick is an exhibition by visual artist Raija Malka and composer Kaija Saariaho that will fill the museum’s large exhibition hall with a multisensory total work of art.

“Distances between important people, places and memories are mentally involved in the music for this exhibition, which began with my composition Stilleben. Nostalgia has been present in my life since I moved away from Finland. Raija and I share this feeling – also in regard to each other – as we lived in Paris at the same time for six years, and often worked together,” Saariaho says.

“My installation Blick was born out of the world of Stillebenand its nostalgic undercurrent. However, working in the Amos Rex space brought new parts to the work: Utopie, Warten and Menschen. Kaija composed new music for these. Our collaboration is like playing a game where the ball bounces back and forth,” Malka says.

Blick runs from May 12 to August 22, 2021.

The 65^th International Festival of Contemporary Music, titled Choruses and dedicated to vocal dramaturgies in contemporary composition, will take place in Venice from September 17^th to 26^th. Inauguration day on September 17^th will be dedicated to Kaija Saariaho, featuring the Award ceremony for the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement (Ca’ Giustinian, at 12 noon) and the opening concert performed by the Orchestra and Chorus of the Teatro La Fenice in Venice conducted by Ernest Martinez-Isquierdo (Teatro La Fenice, at 8 pm). The programme includes the Italian premiere performance of Oltra Mar, for chorus and orchestra, composed by Kaija Saariaho in 1999 and the Italian premiere performance of an orchestral work by Hans Abrahamsen written in 2011 and based on the orchestration of Claude Debussy’s Children’s Corner.

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Regular collaborators such as Pia Freund, Eija Kankaanranta, Camilla Hoitenga, Jennifer Koh, Olari Elts, Anssi Karttunen, Kari Kriikku, Olivier Latry, Ernest Martinez Izquierdo, Xavier de Maistre, Dima Slobodeniuk, Meta4, Secession Orchestra, among others, will be performing several Saariaho works across the festival, including the world premiere of Light still and moving and the French premieres of True Fire, Trans, Adriana Songs, Light and matter, Offrande, Figura. For further details about the Festival, please visit the festival website.

2017 also marks the beginning of Kaija Saariaho’s residence at Orchestre des Pays de la Loire. The inaugural concert, conducted by Pascal Rophé, took place last 11 January. Kari Kriikku will perform D’OM LE VRAI SENS next March and other exciting programmes will come in the 2017-2018 season.

In this season, Saariho’s recent opera, Only the Sound Remains, will receive it’s Finnish premiere at Finnish National Opera. As well, Kaija Saariaho will be the Bergen International Festival featured composer. The performances will include La Passion de Simone, Graal Théâtre and the Concordio world premiere.