The Raven (Sibelius)

The Raven (in German: Der Rabe) was a projected song for soprano and orchestra that occupied the Finnish composer Jean Sibelius from 9 November to mid-December 1910, at which point he abandoned the project. The piece, a commission by the world-renowned, Finnish prima donna Aino Ackté as a novelty for her February 1911 tour through Imperial Germany, was to have set a German-language translation of Edgar Allan Poe's 1845 narrative poem The Raven. Sibelius had accepted reluctantly, as he had at the time been at work on—and struggling to meet an early-1911 deadline for—the Fourth Symphony (Op. 63). Juggling major projects proved too much for him to bear, and on 11 December he reneged on the agreement with Ackté, greatly upsetting their professional relationship. Three years later, however, Sibelius made amends by composing for Ackté Luonnotar (Op. 70), a virtuosic, Kalevala-themed tone poem for soprano and orchestra.

As with other aborted projects—for example, the Wagnerian opera The Building of the Boat (Veneen luominen, 1893–1894) and the oratorio Marjatta (1905)—Sibelius did not discard, but rather repurposed, the fruits of his labor. In this case, he incorporated material from The Raven into Movement IV of the Symphony No. 4.