Harri Viitanen

Finnish composer Harri Viitanen (b.1954).
For Viitanen, composing is a mode of expression whereby he seeks to organize and label his environment. As a composer, he designs sound worlds - arranging silence, sound and time. Viitanen considers music part of nature. His vision of the starry vault of heaven, the firmament, is linked to the fundamental questions of existence, inspiring him in a Pythagorean vein to calculate the numeric ratios between heavenly bodies and to apply the ancient theory of the harmony of the spheres to modern computer-aided composition techniques. Another natural element in which Viitanen has found inspiration is birdsong, which he uses as raw material for computer processing. Not only does Viitanen use natural elements as input for his musical language, he also understands them as a manifestation of sacredness to aspire to. 'Through natural phenomena, Man can perceive the scent of Heaven. In nature we encounter the sacral.' He has expounded this idea in several of his organ works where birdsong is transmuted into a rich musical idiom.