‘The Profound Logic’: Symphony and Psychotherapy. Comini, Menin, Stadlen, Vihinen conduct Inner Circle Seminar 118 (23 September 2007)




Portrait of Jean Sibelius (1894)
by Axeli Gallen-Kallela

‘The Profound Logic’

Symphony and Psychotherapy

Sibelius and Mahler: Helsinki 1907

Alessandra Comini
Sarah Menin
Anthony Stadlen
Antti Vihinen

conduct

Inner Circle Seminar No. 118

Sunday 23 September 2007

10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Portrait of Gustav Mahler (1907)
by Axeli Gallen Kallela



50 years ago, SIBELIUS died (20 September 1957), aged 91. 100 years ago, he met MAHLER (ca. 1 November 1907) in Helsinki. Sibelius said they discussed the symphony with ‘life and death’ intensity. Sibelius praised it for ‘the profound logic that creates an inner connection between all its motives’. Mahler said it should be ‘like the world; it should embrace everything’.

Are Sibelius’s and Mahler’s concepts of the symphony truly contradictory?

Is true psychotherapy not a kind of symphony, that reveals both a person’s being-in-the-world and the profound logic that connects all its motives?

Today, we discuss these life-and-death questions.

1. ALESSANDRA COMINI (Distinguished Professor of Art History Emerita, Meadows School of the Arts, Dallas, Texas)

Encounter in Finland, 1907: Sibelius, Mahler, Gallen-Kallela and the great questions of life and death.

2. ANTTI VIHINEN (Managing Director, Sibelius Hall, Lahti, Finland)

‘Mr Sibelius, I presume’: When Gustav Mahler met Jean Sibelius.

3. SARAH MENIN (Reader in Architectural History and Theory, Centre for Tectonic Cultures, University of Newcastle)

Joining the disparate: The role of ‘symphysis’ and ‘logos’ in the life and music of Jean Sibelius.

4. ANTHONY STADLEN (Existential psychotherapist, London)

The ‘profound logic’ in symphony and psychotherapy.

Venue: Room F, Regent’s College, Inner Circle, Regent’s Park, London NW1
Cost: students £88, others £110, some bursaries
Apply to: Anthony Stadlen, ‘Oakleigh’, 2A Alexandra Avenue, London N22 7XE
Tel: +44 (0) 20 8888 6857 E-mail: stadlen@aol.com