Radix (2013–14)
a brass quintet

Trumpet in C, Trumpet in Bb, Horn in F, Tenor Trombone, Tuba (F)
Duration: 12'
Commissioned by Ensemble Schwerpunkt, with funds provided by Madetoja Foundation (Madetoja-säätiö) and Swedish Cultural Foundation in Finland (Svenska kulturfonden).
Fp: Ensemble Schwerpunkt, 5 November 2013, Helsinki in a concert organized by Korvat auki

This recording is from a live performance by Ensemble Schwerpunkt on 14 June 2015 at the Müncherer Gasteig as part of the aDevantgarde.13 festival (Munich, Germany).

Documentation shared here with everybody's kind permission.

Radix (2013–14) for brass quintet

Levitations (2023) for cl trb vc pno

another no-input pedalboard improvisation (8/2025)

Ensemble Adapter
16 September 2016
Rotation / Adoptions 2016
ExRotaprint, Berlin-Wedding

Ensemble Adapter:
Kristjana Helgadóttir, alto flute
Ingólfur Vilhjálmsson, bass clarinet (& paper)
Gunnhildur Einarsdóttir, harp (& electric fan)
Matthias Engler, percussion (Marimba, 2 cymb., G.C.)

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Studies on Empathy

Commissioned by Ensemble Adapter
with funds provided by Madetoja-säätiö (Madetoja Foundation)

“…the body in the voice as it sings, the hand as it writes, the limb as it performs…” (Roland Barthes, “Le grain de la voix”)*

Studies on Empathy (2016) takes materiality as the medium of musical expression, i.e. the information that the sound carries of its own immediate production: how much force, resistance, friction, sensitivity… I experience this kind of listening as empathetic. This is an important aspect, because, as even modern neuroscience tells us, the opposite of loving your fellow man is not hating them—it is indifference.

Written in positive feelings of continuity, trust, passion and friendship, this work is my second Ensemble Adapter commission to date.

© 2016 Jarkko Hartikainen


* translation from the French original by Stephen Heath; Image Music Text, 1977








www.jarkkohartikainen.net
www.ensemble-adapter.de

Studies on Empathy (2016) for quartet

Tapiola Sinfonietta, cond. Mario Venzago
Feb 9, 2017
Musica nova Helsinki
Espoo, Finland

Commissioned by Tapiola Sinfonietta
https://jarkkohartikainen.net/habitus/
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Habitus (2014–17)

Orkesteri kehona. Ihmisistä ja soitinäänistä muodostuvana hengittävänä kehona tilassa. Kehon rajat ja raajat. Niin kipupisteet kuin mukavatkin asennot. Kehon muutokset ajan kuluessa tai suhteessa tilaan, kuten vaikkapa kaatuessa, rasituksessa, istuessa, odottaessa. Henkeä pidättäessä, syvään hengittäessä. Kehon rytmit. Äänestä välittyvä kehollis-empaattinen tunnetieto.

Kehon sanattomat viestit ja vaatimukset. Happi. Liike. Toisto. Venytys. Hermot, kudokset. Muistot ja pelotkin siellä jossakin säikeessä. Beethoven ja Sibelius kehon lihasmuistissa. Kehollinen aikakäsitys ja sitä kautta kehon suhde ympäristöönsä, siihen villiin luontoon, josta se on syntynyt ja jonka selässä se elää. Yhden kehon näkeminen toisen, suuremman, osana. Tai useammasta koostuvana, kulttuuris-yhteiskunnallisena kehona. Konkreettisuus spekulatiivisuuden sijaan.

Niin ja tietenkin valta. Tietoisesti kehoon vaikuttaminen. Esimerkki: stressitilan helpottaminen parasympaattisen hermoston ns. kiertäjähermon jarrua (nucleus ambiguus) painamalla – eli yksinkertaisesti uloshengitystä tietoisesti pidentämällä.

Säveltäminen on vähintäänkin yhteen kehoon vaikuttamista. Minussa nämä ajatukset tuottivat tietynlaista veistoksellis-meditatiivista aaltoilua, jonka “päämotiiviksi” nouseva rytminen profiili on yksinkertaisesti esitettynä, esimerkiksi: 3 (tauko) 6 (tauko). Tämä rytmiteema toistuu, paitsi ihan oikeassa pelko- ja jopa vihakoulutuksessakin käytetyssä hengitysrytmissä, myös esimerkiksi ääneen lausutuissa, sisään- ja uloshengitykseen liittyvinäkin nähtävissä sanapareissa, kuten vaikkapa ‘luo – luota’ tai ‘syvään – ääneen’. Musiikki alkaa sanojen jälkeen, mutta ainahan eri suhteistoja (eräänlaisia kehoja nekin) voi asettaa elämään rinnakkain tai sisäkkäin, kuten olen tässä yrittänyt tehdä.

Habitus (2014–17) on kasvukaupunkini parhaan sinfonisen kehon Tapiola Sinfoniettan tilauksesta syntynyt orkesterikappale, suunniteltu tässä Musica nova Helsinki -festivaalin osana olevassa konsertissa esitettäväksi – ja on kaikille tähän liittyville kiitoksin omistettu.

© 2017 Jarkko Hartikainen

for English translation of the programme note, see https://jarkkohartikainen.net/habitus/

Musica nova Helsinki 2017

Habitus (2014–17) for orchestra

Elevations (2017) for ensemble
flute, oboe, clarinet, marimba, piano, violin, viola, cello, double bass
Fp. 20 August 2017 Schloss Solitude (Stuttgart, Germany) by Ensemble SurPlus, cond. Erich Wagner

Elevations (2017), scored for nine instruments, develops the musical material into multiple, yet transparent interpretations of the concepts of rising, transcending, elevating, or increasing (true to title). The music aims to get higher, to cross thresholds – to increase sonic awareness. The material is based on acoustic phenomena on instruments, such as flageolets, beatings, multiphonics and registral characteristics of intervals, all adhering to a similar directional, elaborative, ascending tendency. The empirical, sound-based composition process, I hope, is not merely replicating the ancient human occupancy of brick-making ('filling form x with material y') as the above language might suggest. (For me it's a false dichotomy, anyway.) Yet, the piece is also decisively non-conceptual, containing no 'extra-musical' stimuli. It also does its best (if at all possible) to avoid the position of an academic outside artist-commentator who elevates themselves above their appropriated or down-right stolen source material. This conceptual simplicity should render all prerequisites to listening (outside of silence and alertness), even this text, basically obsolete.
(c) 2017 Jarkko Hartikainen

Elevations (2017) for ensemble

2 Dec 2017 premiere at WHS Teatteri Union, Helsinki
defunensemble

Hanna Kinnunen, bass flute
Mikko Raasakka, bass clarinet
Lily-Marlene Puusepp, harp
Emil Holmström, piano and sampler
Markus Hohti, cello
Timo Kurkikangas, electronics
_____

(seepings) is a piece about integration, about belonging, about and within the lived materiality of recorded music.

dedicated to (and commissioned by) defunensemble.

© 2017 Jarkko Hartikainen


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(seepings) (2017) for ensemble and sampler
commissioned and premiered by, and dedicated to, defunensemble (Helsinki, Finland, EU)

Since I identify as a huge music nerd who seems to have an actively hypersensitive creative brain regarding sonic phenomena, associations to existing music often disrupt my creative work flow that strives for freshness and new contexts in a concentrated acoustic listening environment. In (seepings) (2017), which began as an inquiry into finding a personal relationship with ‘the electroacoustic’, I let such echoes of certain unescapable past influences seep through rather concretely – using ‘their’ instrument, the loudspeaker.

From a half-second of recorded music, the human brain is typically capable of recognizing only the genre and the decade (if even that), according to scientific studies in mental chronometry. This is naturally relative to the listener’s personal experiences with music(s), yet there exists a certain biological hard limit where we are able to listen to specific sounds with utmost concentration yet can’t recognize them as individual artistic expressions but rather as representations of larger musico-cultural contexts.

We may even repeatedly misrecognize the agency behind a short enough audio snippet with someone else using the same instruments, technology, etc. Then again, a shared pitch or chord (or a compositional logic that makes several very short impulses form one melody or scale) may make otherwise unrelated samples appear as an original work of a third party. I have studied the complexity and the edges of this psychological phenomenon with deliberate artistic research into the materiality of short samples of certain personally influential musical sounds: how they react to each other in different durations, proximities, and compositions in general.

© 2018 Jarkko Hartikainen

(seepings) (2017) for ensemble and sampler [bootleg]

Sini Virtanen, violin
McCormick Percussion Group
Robert McCormick, conductor

live recording from the world premiere
April 8, 2018 10am (rescheduled from April 7, 2018 7:30pm due to a sudden campus-wide power outage and subsequent evacuation)
2018 USF New-Music Festival
University of South Florida
Tampa, Florida
USA






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ICE CONCERTO (2018) for violin solo and percussion ensemble

Dedicated to the musicianship of the violin artista Sini Virtanen (Helsinki, FI) — commissioner of the work, funded by Madetoja Foundation — as well as Robert McCormick and his McCormick Percussion Group (USF Tampa, FL). They all gave an absolutely spectacular world premiere at the enticingly tour-de-force USF New-Music Festival 2018 in Tampa, followed by a concentrated and highly musical world premiere recording of my musical little daydream, later on the very same day (!), at the city's prestigious Spring Theatre studio.

© 2018 Jarkko Hartikainen

ICE CONCERTO (2018) for violin solo and percussion ensemble

Written during the Composing for Accordion workshop, on the first week of the Darmstadt Summer Courses 2018, under the tutorship of composer Rebecca Saunders and accordionist Krassimir Sterev. 

Performed by (and created in tight collaboration with) accordionist Manca Dornik, who premiered the work at the Kleine Sporthalle of the Lichtenbergschule in Darmstadt, July 21, 2018 as part of the official festival program of the 49. Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik Darmstadt. At the end of the Darmstadt Summer Course 2018, Manca Dornik was awarded the Stipendiumpreis for her performance in, among others, this concert.


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Note on the programme leaflet of Darmstädter Ferienkurse 2018:

"Jarkko Hartikainen: CARDIO (2018) for accordion – world premiere

In CARDIO (2018), written earlier this week here in Darmstadt, I was focusing on the physicality of the accordion sound – the way external pressure can be applied on the body of the instrument to create various delicate acoustic phenomena. The piece was written in exceptionally tight (luxurious!) co-operation with the enthusiastic, fearless, talented and fun accordionist that is Manca Dornik.

–Jarkko Hartikainen"

Cardio (2018) for accordion

Eriikka Maalismaa, violin

Avanti! Summer Sounds Festival 2018, Porvoo (Finland, EU)
30 June 2018
world premiere
commissioned by Eriikka Maalismaa, the work's dedicatee, with funds provided by TEOSTO Commissioning Grant
recorded by Matti Heinonen, post-editing by Libero Mureddu
photo of Eriikka Maalismaa at the premiere by Heikki Tuuli

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EMBODIED: Violin Solo (2018)

Although EMBODIED: Violin Solo (2018) is through-composed and fully-notated, it is also simultaneously a communal halting by the sound produced in front of our ears by the observant, empathetic and touching coexistence and presence of a violinist and (t)he(i)r violin, who share a life together. Compositionally (in)formed meeting of two resonant material bodies. A loving squeeze.

The score, written in four days (the act of composing had, for the most part, happened by then), is both compositionally documenting the sounds produced at the meeting of the composer and the performer — both armed with violins under their chins — as well as serving as a starting point for the violinist Eriikka Maalismaa's (the work's commissioner and premierer) astounding capabilities to find immeasurable sonic nuances from her instrument. The violin's wooden-metallic corporeality is gently tickled, stroked and excited in musically embodied compassion.

The composition process began with a month-long meditative 'deep-sea sounding' on a borrowed violin in Trastevere, Rome. The EMBODIED family of works will be completed by works for solo tuba and solo percussion of identical lengths; these three works can be also played together in all possible formations—all the way up to the trio EMBODIED: Triple Solo— where the overall form will be perceived differently in each version.

IX/2018 Jarkko Hartikainen


EMBODIED: Violin Solo (2018)

Vaikka EMBODIED: Violin Solo (2018) on läpisävelletty, läpinotatoitu, on se samalla yhtälaisesti korviemme edessaäsoittaja–soitin-yhteiselosta syntyvä äänen äärelle pysähtyminen; havainnoiva, empaattinen ja koskettava läsnäolon hetki. Sävellyksellisesti muovattu värähtelyherkkien materiaalisten olentojen kohtaaminen. Rutistus.

Neljässä päivässä kirjoitettu partituuri (sävellystyö oli pääpiirteissään jo tuohon mennessä tehty) on samalla sekä transkriptio säveltäjän ja esiintyjän kohtaamisen äänistä– molemmilla viulut leuan alla – että lähtöalusta Eriikka Maalismaan hämmästyttäville kyvyille löytää lukemattomia erilaisia sävyjä soittimestaan, jonka puisen-metallista ruumiillisuutta teoksessani hellästi kutitetaan, silitellään ja ärsytetään kehollis-musiikillisesti myötäeläen.

Teoksen sävellysprosessi käynnistyi kuukauden mittaisella syväluotauksella lainaviuluun Trasteveressa, Roomassa. Teosperhe täydentyy vastaavanmittaisilla sooloteoksilla tuuballe sekä lyömäsoittimille; nämä kolme teosta voidaan soittaa myös yhtä aikaa eri yhdistelminä – aina trioon EMBODIED: Triple Solo asti –, jolloin teoksen kokonaismuoto hahmottuu aina eri tavoin.

IX/2018 Jarkko Hartikainen

EMBODIED: Violin Solo (2018)

Live performance, June 3rd 2019 at Cité internationale des Arts, Paris (France)

•° Jarkko Hartikainen's "EMBODIED: Violin Solo (2018)" a magnificently turbulent journey through the viscera of the instrument, and self. Exploring the 'rebel' side of the instrument, the wolf tone.. at first one hears it as wild, untamed.. but soon, one realises it is very rich and willing to take you on a wildest of journeys. (DS)

•° "EMBODIED is a cycle of works(-in-progress) in which the empathetic resonances of subtle corporeal nuances in musical sound are offered as a composed communal concert experience. Plans so far include music for violin, voice (soprano), tuba and percussionist. Separately, solo, alone – but also together, in all the possible formations. The different combinations from duos and trios to the full quartet (and beyond?) offer unique forms where individualism is reflected on the communal. Methodically, these works explore close, explorative composer-performer collaboration. As of writing (May 2019), the first two solo pieces, and their duo, exist." (JH)

EMBODIED: Violin Solo was commissioned and premiered by Eriikka Maalismaa (with support by TEOSTO), in June 2018. 

https://jarkkohartikainen.net
http://www.dejanasekulic.com
http://temporalityoftheimpossible.com

Image: Daniel Hochbaum and Adam Cohen: the electrical firing of a neuron as a flash of light, detectable by specially modified optical microscopes.

Jarkko Hartikainen - EMBODIED: Violin Solo (2018)

www.jarkkohartikainen.net
sheet music: core.musicfinland.fi/composers/jarkko-hartikainen

Jarkko Hartikainen is a composer striving to create works that explore what music is and could still be, researching the possibilities in sound through rigorous performer-collaboration as well as studying findings in a plethora of disciplines. Stimulating acoustic phenomena, exciting sonorities and concrete, bodily impulses through rhythm, resonance and empathy fuel his often extremely instrument-specific, concentrated writing. Currently Hartikainen is working as a commission-based freelance composer, as well as pursuing his D.Mus degree at the Sibelius Academy of the University of the Arts Helsinki. Eriikka Maalismaa, defunensemble, Tapiola Sinfonietta, Ensemble Adapter and other such distinguished performers have recently promoted his work.

another no-input pedalboard improvisation (8/2025)

Jarkko Hartikainen

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