True Stories

Previous
Next

True Stories is a semi-staged song cycle for a lied duo and tape. It is strongly inspired by Maria Turunen‘s dramatic Zwischenfach Voice and Arman Madaar‘s virtuosic pianistic work. True Stories brings to the stage early and unknown versions of various fairy tales. We know them as bedtime stories for children, but the primitive, unrestrained and unashamed versions in True Stories would keep any child awake: Little Red Riding Hood feasts on her grandmother’s blood, ghosts howl lewdly in dark outhouses, and the stepmother dances to her death in red-hot iron shoes.

Hyytiäinen says: “In these songs, sexuality, horror and embodiment are present in a way that only the most dramatic classical singing voice can convey. Its obscenely wide emotional range is excessive, suffocating and pre-human, just like these stories themselves. And to our horror, we realise that all of this is already hidden within our own subconscious.”

The Kone Foundation generously supports the project “Äänekkäin ja vaietuin”, in which Hyytiäinen composes contemporary music with a dramatic singer and tells unprecedented stories. True Stories is the first piece in this project

 
PERFORMANCEs
 
Soprano Maria Turunen and pianist Armaan Madar celebrate their 15 years of collaboration in the concert based on fairy tales.
7.11.2026 18h
In Helsinki Conservatorium Concert Hall
Ruoholahdentori 16
 
 

Other projects:

Hearing queer

a music theatre performance for thre performers celebrating queerness Image by Xiyadie