ABSTRACT
Oskar Merikanto has the particular distinction of producing the first opera ever to be written to a libretto in Finnish and was a successful and popular figure in his homeland. The familiar idea of some periods of compositional activity may be applied to an overview of Merikanto's output, but in a far from typical manner; there is little or no traditional sense of linear progression or gradual maturity of style, for example. A search for political stability is reflected in the national-romantic nature of Finnish music at the time, and with such a hugely successful exponent as Sibelius offering a masterly balance between both old and new, the musical establishment would not have welcomed any modernist challenge. The sad reality is that Merikanto himself never really knew who he was, in that he never fully understood or valued what he had achieved – and therein lies the madness.
