Kaija Saariaho (* 14. October 1952 in Helsinki; † 2. June 2023 in Paris) was a
Finnish composer. For 13 years Saariaho attended the Helsinki Rudolf Steiner School, a school with a strong arts and music curriculum, and studied violin and piano at the Sibelius Academy. She later studied composition in Freiburg (under
Brian Ferneyhough and
Klaus Huber) and at
IRCAM in Paris, where she has lived since 1982. Saariaho was influenced by post-
serialism, but she grew to find it too restrictive: "You were not allowed to have pulse, or tonally oriented harmonies, or melodies. I don'…
read more