Maija Anttila

Maija Anttila (1988) is a Finnish musician based in Amsterdam. With clarinet/bass clarinet and live- electronics as her tools, she is dedicated to performing music of out time. Maija collaborates with composers all over the world playing numerous premiers of solo-, chamber music - as well as orchestral works. In the meantime she is also active in the fields of free improvisation, folk music, and progressive punk. Alongside her solo projects Maija plays in Tampering Ensemble, Trio TRE, Absolem, and Barmy57. Maija has obtained her Bachelor’s degree in music both in Finland (Tampere Music Academu 2015) and the Netherlands (Conservatorium van Amsterdam 2018). Finnish Cultural Foundation and Finnish Music Foundation have supported her studies and artistic work.

Maija’s Reflection

When I saw in facebook that my friend I-lly Cheng was looking for musicians to play her piece Yours Mine, I fell immediately in love with the concept of it. I have already for a long time asked myself questions about what is a musical experience, and how much of it is created by composer, performer, listener, and by time and venue. In a way, each performance of music is a unique experience for each of the listeners, and therefore equally important. I-lly’s piece brings these thoughts really into the frame.

The piece itself was challenging to put together, as only after searching for samples, recording and mixing them, and battling with some technical details (such as pressing the pedal 141 times during the piece) I was able to actually hear what I was about to create. Only after realizing that there’s a point where I should give up with trying to follow all the instructions that the composer gives, and do the remaining decisions only by ear, the piece started to make sense to me. The conclusion became some sort of a bursting flow of sounds, that are together something more than a sum of its parts.