Tara Valkonen: Farliga drömmar

Tara Valkonen (b. 1999) started to play cello at the age of six, and soon she was imagining her future as a professional cellist – and a sculptor. But picking up the guitar at the age of 13 brought a change, as it was rock music now that became the main interest in her life for some years, all until she heard Messiaen’s Turangalîla-Symphonie that conquered her mind making her passionately interested in contemporary music. Tara’s studies and work have been kindly supported by the Finnish Cultural Foundation, Sibelius Academy Foundation, Arts Promotion Centre Finland, Greta and William Lehtinen Foundation and The Finnish Music Foundation.

Farliga drömmar, writes the composer, “is a short piece for a singer and tape, which I composed in March–April of 2022 for the wonderful genre-hopping singer Anni Elif Egecioglu. I’d wanted to compose to Edith Södergran’s poems for a long time, and since Anni is a native Swedish speaker, I knew this would be the perfect opportunity to do so. I had started drawing a dream of mine, in which a living dead figure was working on a farm in rural Finland and remembered a poem called ‘Farliga Drömmar’ (Dangerous Dreams), which suited the zeitgeist – personally and globally.”