The Swan of Tuonela (Tuonelan joutsen) is an 1895 tone poem by the Finnish composer Jean Sibelius. It is part of the Lemminkäinen Suite (Four Legends from the Kalevala), Op. 22, based on the Finnish mythological epic the Kalevala.

🇫🇮 Jean Sibelius (1865-1957)
The Swan of Tuonela, Op. 22: No. 2 (1895)

The Swan of Tuonela was originally composed in 1893 as the prelude to a projected opera called The Building of the Boat. Sibelius revised it two years later, making it the second section of his Lemminkäinen Suite of four tone poems, which was premiered in 1896. He twice further revised the piece, in 1897 and 1900. Sibelius left posterity no personal account of his writing of the tone poem, and its original manuscript no longer exists (the date of its disappearance is unknown). The work was first published by K. F. Wasenius in Helsingfors (Helsinki), Finland, in April 1901. The German firm Breitkopf & Härtel also published it in Leipzig, also in 1901. The work was recorded for the first time by Leopold Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra in May 1929.

Performers:
Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Herbert von Karajan

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