Jean Sibelius

Jean Sibelius was Finland’s preeminent composer, whose seven symphonies and thirteen tone poems — above all Finlandia — helped forge a national identity under Russian political pressure. He knew the critics’ sting first-hand: his Fourth Symphony drew mixed reviews at its premiere, and works dismissed in one city triumphed in another. He produced no major work after 1926 and fell into the three-decade quiet known as the “silence of Järvenpää”; when he died in 1957 the UN General Assembly paused for him.