Two Partsongs, op. 65

The two choruses in Jean Sibelius’s Op. 65 are different in both their languages, Swedish and Finnish, as well as their conceptions. Män från slätten och havet Op. 65a was commissioned by the Music Committee of Svenska Folkskolans Vänner, a Swedish-speaking educational organization which staged a singing festival in Vaasa in June 1912. The first performance took place in the final concert of the festival with about 1300 singers in total, although a string accompaniment had to be used to perform the relatively difficult polyphonic piece. The much simpler Kallion kirkon kellosävel Op. 65b was originally composed by Sibelius as the melody for the carillon of a newly built church in the district Kallio in Helsinki. Reports from the consecration in September 1912, however, named the choir conductor Heikki Klemetti as composer. Sibelius therefore felt forced to write arrangements for piano solo and mixed choir a cappella and publish them. Klemetti eventually wrote a new text for the latter. The current edition includes translations of the texts in German and English as well as an informative preface that is based on the complete edition Jean Sibelius Works, just like the score.