Klemetti, Heikki

views updated

Klemetti, Heikki

Klemetti, Heikki, Finnish composer and choral conductor; b. Kuortane, Feb. 14, 1876; d. Helsinki, Aug. 26, 1953. He studied philosophy, then music at the Stern Cons, in Berlin. In 1900 he founded the famous men’s choir Suomen Laulu (became a mixed choir in 1907), with which he toured Scandinavia and Europe (1901–25) and the U.S. (1939). He led it until 1942. He publ. a history of music (several vols, from 1916), a textbook of choral singing (1917), and a textbook of voice production (1920); composed numerous choruses, masses, and antiphons (collected and officially approved as the hymnal of the State Church of Finland in 1924); also arranged songs for school and home (3 vols., 1927-28) and some early church music.

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire