Here we encounter not one Einojuhani Rautavaara, but three: the fledgeling student captivated by folklore; the dodecaphonic zealot stretching the expressive potential of ‘the system’; and lastly, the triumphant melodist basking in his own unique brand of harmonic complexity. The stylistic leap from Rautavaara’s Second Quartet to his Quintet, or Unknown Heavens (Rimbaud’s title in translation) is more a matter of tone than temperament. All three works are ceaselessly active, the First (1952) being perhaps the leanest (certainly the shortest), and the last (1997) the richest in texture.
Unknown Heavens takes its name from an earlier work for male chorus, which Rautavaara actually quotes, initially in the second bar of the first movement (“when the second violin answers the question opposed by the first,” as Rautavaara himself writes), many times thereafter, and then significantly revised (“in inverted intervals”) at the start of the fourth movement. Readers who appreciate the glowing modulations that visit and nourish Rautavaara’s ‘Angel’ pieces will recognize them again here, especially in the predominantly lyrical second and fourth movements. The third begins as a cello duet, sure justification of why – and how – five players are employed where the Kuhmo Music Festival originally commissioned a piece for four. “The work seemed to acquire a will of its own,” writes Rautavaara and indeed, the Quintet bears witness to a warming stream of consciousness.
The equally well performed string quartets are stylistically rather more challenging (and by that I don’t necessarily mean more original). The First Quartet plays for just over 11 minutes and inhabits a mildly rustic world roughly akin to Kodaly. Best here is the Andante’s haunting coda, whereas the 1958 Second Quartet is at its most inventive for the faster second and fourth movements.
Many of the later quartet’s slower passages sound to me like a great deal of music of the period, for although Rautavaara had pledged to combine “a living harmonic event” with dodecaphonic construction, the emergent voice is that of a chorus member rather than of a true individual. The current Rautavaara is more relaxed, more contemplative, more wise and softer-grained than his former self. He seems happier reflecting nature than organizing abstract patterns: you sense that the Quintet is authentically self-expressive, whereas the quartets speak interestingly about nothing in particular. The recordings are full-bodied and well balanced. Recommended.'