
Heidi Gabriella Wilhelmina Sundblad-Halme (25 September 1903 – 30 April 1973) was a Finnish composer and conductor who founded the Helsinki Women's Orchestra and conducted it for 30 years.
Career
Sundblad-Halme was born in
Jakobstad
Jakobstad (; , ) is a town in Finland, located on the west coast of the country. Jakobstad is situated in Ostrobothnia (administrative region), Ostrobothnia, along the Gulf of Bothnia. The population of Jakobstad is approximately , while the Jako ...
, where her father Henrik Sundblad was a composer, cantor, and organist. She married Deputy Judge Helge Halme in 1930. The couple traveled to the Soviet Union and several Baltic countries, and published accounts of their travels in Finnish newspapers. Sundblad-Halme directed a private music school until they moved to Helsinki in 1933. Their son Hannu was born in 1935.
Sundblad-Halme studied music at the
Helsinki Conservatory
The Sibelius Academy (, ) is part of the University of the Arts Helsinki and a university-level music school which operates in Helsinki and Kuopio, Finland. It also has an adult education centre in Järvenpää and a training centre in Seinäjoki ...
(later the Sibelius Academy of the
University of the Arts Helsinki
The University of the Arts Helsinki (, ), also known as Uniarts Helsinki, is a Finnish arts university that was launched in the beginning of 2013. Apart from a few exceptions, it is the only university in Finland that provides education in the f ...
)
from 1927 to 1933, then privately in Berlin and Lund, Switzerland. Her teachers included
Dean Dixon
Charles Dean Dixon (January 10, 1915November 3, 1976) was an American conductor.
Career
Dixon was born in the upper-Manhattan neighborhood of Harlem in New York City to parents who had earlier migrated from the Caribbean. He studied conducting ...
,
Leo Funtek
Leo Funtek (August 21, 1885 – January 13, 1965) was a Slovenian violinist, conductor and arranger. He is best known for work as a music professor and for his 1922 arrangement of Modest Mussorgsky's piano suite '' Pictures at an Exhibition''.
...
,
Clemens Krauss
Clemens Heinrich Krauss (31 March 189316 May 1954) was an Austrian conducting, conductor and opera impresario, particularly associated with the music of Richard Strauss, Johann Strauss and Richard Wagner. He founded the Vienna New Year's Concert ...
,
Erkki Melartin
Erkki Gustaf Melartin (7 February 1875 – 14 February 1937) was a Finnish composer, conductor, and teacher of the late-Romantic and early-modern periods. Melartin is generally considered to be one of Finland's most significant national Romant ...
,
Väinö Raitio
Väinö Eerikki Raitio (15 April 1891 – 10 September 1945) was part of the small group of composers who appeared in the Finnish art music scene in the 1920s with a new cosmopolitan music style, very different from the dominant conservative Nat ...
, and Sulho Ranta. During the mid-1930s, she conducted orchestra concerts in the Finnish cities of Turku, Tampere, and Helsinki. Conductor
Georg Schnéevoigt
Georg Lennart Schnéevoigt (8 November 1872 – 28 November 1947) was a Finnish Conducting, conductor and cellist, born in Vyborg, Grand Duchy of Finland, which is now in Russia, to Ernst Schnéevoigt and Rosa Willandt.
Career
Schnéevoigt ...
reportedly suggested that Sundblad-Halme start an all-female orchestra so the men in regular orchestras wouldn't be distracted by a female conductor.
She formed the Helsinki Women's Orchestra in 1938 and conducted it until 1968.
Sundblad-Halme corresponded with musicologist
Otto Andersson and poet Jacob Tegengren, and collaborated with dancer Sage Gundborg-Heilbut. In 1963, she received the
Pro Finlandia
Pro is an abbreviation meaning "professional".
Pro, PRO or variants thereof might also refer to:
People
* Miguel Pro (1891–1927), Mexican priest
* Pro Hart (1928–2006), Australian painter
* Mlungisi Mdluli (born 1980), South African reti ...
award, and in 1968, the Director Musices award. In a newspaper interview toward the end of her life, she commented that she “would prefer
o be
O, or o, is the fifteenth letter and the fourth vowel letter of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''o'' (pronounced ), ...
a man ... as a woman
havereceived so much opposition and anonymous phone calls and demands to stop all the fuss.”
Sundblad-Halme composed many piano and violin teaching pieces for children. She set texts by the following poets to music: V. M. Fokke,
Bertel Gripenberg
''Bertel'' Johan Sebastian, Baron Gripenberg, born 19 September 1878 in Saint Petersburg, died 6 May 1947, was a Finland-Swedish poet. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature fourteen times.
Career
His early poetry was inspired by f ...
,
L. Onerva
L. Onerva (real name Hilja Onerva Lehtinen, 28 April 1882 – 1 March 1972) was a Finnish poet. Onerva also wrote short stories and novels and worked as a translator and critic. In her works, she often dealt with tension in women's lives concer ...
,
Edith Södergran
Edith Irene Södergran (4 April 1892 – 24 June 1923) was a Swedish-speaking Finnish poet. One of the first modernists within Swedish-language literature, her influences came from French Symbolism, German expressionism, and Russian f ...
,
Katri Vala
Katri Vala (1901–1944) was a Finnish poet, critic, school teacher, and central member of the literary group Tulenkantajat (The Fire Bearers) with Olavi Paavolainen, Elina Vaara, Lauri Viljanen, Ilmari Pimiä, Viljo Kajava, and Yrjö Jylhä.
...
, E. von Knape, and
Einari Vuorela
Einari Arvid Vuorela (17 August 1889, in Keuruu – 10 July 1972, in Helsinki) was a Finnish writer. He was born in the village Jukojärvi in a family of 10 children, and started his studies at Multia. He became a teacher in Jyväskylä in 1914. ...
. Her music was published by Fazer Music
(today
Fennica Gehrman). Her compositions include:
Compositions
Ballet
*Enchanted Belt
Chamber
*Cello Sonata
*String Quartet
Orchestra
*Elegy,
Op. 4 (for string orchestra)
*Pan Suite
*Vishnu, Op. 13 (orchestration of the piano version)
Piano
*''Vishnu''
Theatre
*''Au Theatre de Marionnettes'', Op. 16
Vocal
*Cantata
*Finnish Folk Songs
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sundblad-Halme, Heidi
Finnish composers
Finnish women conductors (music)
Finnish classical composers
Finnish women classical composers
1903 births
1973 deaths