Musiikin alan kulttuurivaihto Suomesta Yhdysvaltoihin 1949–1969

Suomalaisten musiikin ammattilaisten opintomatkat, niiden rahoittajat ja tavoitteet

Abstrakti

Music in the cultural exchange from Finland to the United States between 1949 and 1969: educational travels, their sponsors and goals

This article explores the educational travels of Finnish musicians from Finland to the United States during the first decades of the Cold War. The aim of the article is to identify the musicians who undertook the travels and to examine their organizers and goals. The focus is on educational and cultural exchange that was sponsored by private and governmental American organizations, and con- trolled by the State Department. The article argues that the travels undertaken by Finnish musicians were significantly linked to the wider cultural program of the United States during the Cold War era, the key purposes of which were to fight the anti-American propaganda of the Soviet Union, and to promote posi- tive images of American culture and society through a mixture of diplomacy and propaganda. The article suggests that the amount of exchange activities between Finland and the United States was at its highest during the examined decades, and that exchange in the field of classical music was exceptionally lively in com- parison to other arts. Among the Finnish grantees of travel stipends were, for example, music professors, the rector of the Sibelius Academy, conductors of symphony orchestras, young composers, the manager of the music section of the Finnish Broadcasting Company, music critics, and instrument pedagogues. The article produces significant new knowledge by showing that even though Finland was not one of the main target countries of the United States’ Cold War cultural program, in the field of music the country invested rather prominently in exchange activities with Finland. The reports of State Department and the United States Information Service in Finland from this period also show that the Finn- ish program was considered very successful among the American officers. The article is based on a wide body of archival material collected mainly in Finland, for example in the archives of the Finnish Committee on Study and Training in the USA, the Finnish-US Educational Exchange Commission, the League of Finn- ish-American Societies in the National Archives of Finland, and the Archives of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland. The article also draws on the personal archives of historian Marek Fields that include material from the archives of the State Department and the United States Information Agency.