19 August 2009 3:00pm
Shout! Meet Finland’s loudest choir
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Oulu in Finland likes its music festivals with a twist. It’s home to the famous Air Guitar Championships - and a male choir that makes an art out of shouting.
As if an air-guitar festival wasn’t enough, Oulu is also home to one of Finland’s most unusual musical ensembles, Mieskuoro Huutajat. The name, which translates to ‘Shouters Male Choir’, says, or rather yells, it all.
Under the steely gaze of conductor and composer Petri Sirtiö, 30-odd men, dressed in smart black suits with rubber ties, shout various complex arrangements of well-known songs and anthems. It’s actually more musical than it sounds, with softly melodic barks building to stunning crescendos of red-faced bellowing. Some shouters have long cardboard tubes to add an orchestral tone to proceedings. It’s a memorable display, added to by their traditionally silent, expressionless entrance and exit.
At times, the shouters have courted controversy, particularly with national anthems; the Finnish embassy in Paris tried, in vain, to prevent them shouting ‘La Marseillaise’. A documentary film, Screaming Men, was even made about their tour to Japan.
Throughout, Sirtiö has trodden a very Finnish line between the totally serious and the absurdly comic. Critics have raved about the primal forces at play, but be assured the Huutajat do everything with a large dose of irony. Check their website for upcoming dates.
