Since 2008, young composers and performers have been coming together year after year in the Creative Dialogue format, which Anssi Karttunen developed together with Magnus Lindberg and Kaija Saariaho, and which Julian Anderson has also been helping to shape since 2022. Following a session in Finland from 24 June to 5 July, this year’s Creative Dialogue will once again take place at the Château de Beauchêne in the Loire Valley from 22 July to 5 August.
Through intensive collaboration, the participants develop their own music, supported where necessary by Anssi Karttunen and invited distinguished musicians and composers. This year’s theme is ‘Movement and Sound Manipulation’. The guests are composer Julian Anderson and choreographer Diana Theocharidis in Finland, and composer Magnus Lindberg, sound designer Timo Kurkikangas and violist Steven Dann in France.
For Anssi Karttunen, the principles of Creative Dialogue stem from his own life story: “I wanted to learn but wasn’t interested in exams, so I left the Sibelius Academy without graduating, and studied privately with people I was interested in. I was so curious about what was happening around me that I never wanted to stop studying and learning, and this attitude still keeps me going today. I am interested in sharing ideas and continuing this circle of learning that I have been a part of.”
On the fundamental principle of Creative Dialogue, he says: “I tried to re-create the kind of environment that I myself found to be most creative: jumping into a real life situation where you can ask any question you want. In order to really learn, we have to become our own teachers. It is only through personal discovery that you can really profoundly move ahead.”
For most participants, this is a wholly new experience. “They find themselves in the situation I was in Finland with my friends Magnus, Kaija, Esa-Pekka and others. We just started learning from each other. Everything was allowed and nobody ever said anything was impossible. This is in fact what music has always been about, what happened when the young Brahms or Beethoven met their colleagues. This is how artistic creation really moves forward.”
Creative Dialogue
