Kaija Saariaho, a Finnish composer brought up in the male-dominated world of high modernism who forged an artistic identity wholly her own and rose to the top ranks of contemporary classical music, died Friday at her home in Paris. She was 70.
Delayed a couple of years by Covid, then brought forward by a day to avoid a strike by staff at the Barbican Centre, the UK premiere of Magnus Lindberg’s Third Piano Concerto proved to be both an epic and a rather empty affair. That invaluable instruction for creative talents in most fields less is more constantly came into my mind when listening to it. Unfortunately it clearly didn’t cross Lindberg’s mind when writing it.