Programs and Events
Sibelius Academy Celebrates Steve Reich's 70th Birthday
The faculty and students at the Sibelius Academy organized a week-long festival of Clapping Music, September 27-October 3, to celebrate "America's greatest living composer" Steve Reich's 70th birthday. The festival included concerts, lectures, workshops and other events, introducing not only works by Reich but also other like-minded composers labeled as "minimalists". Several important experimental works by U.S. composers were performed during the festival, among them those by John Cage, John Adams, Philip Glass, Morton Feldman, and Terry Riley. A new work blue shift by a young U.S. composer Alex Freeman (2001/02 Fulbright scholar in Finland) was taped by the Finnish Broadcasting Company. Freeman's work was commissioned by the U.S. Embassy (Public Affairs Ssection).