Tone Poem Tuesday

I've been slowly developing a greater appreciation for the music of Jean Sibelius over the last few years. He always left me cold in my younger years (Finlandia excepted), but I'm understanding him more and more of late. This work, the Karelia Suite, is one of his youthful works, reflective of his early expressive and outgoing Romanticism. Sibelius is a fascinating figure, a man whose artistic visions eventually failed to maintain pace with the world, resulting in an inward turn that itself led to a nearly permanent stilling of his pen. This work, though, is warm and genial and exciting.