Music: Sibelius Revisited

Finland’s craggy, 78-year-old Jean Sibelius was interviewed early this month, at his villa north of Helsinki, by LIFE Photographer Eliot Elisofon. His report:

“Age had emphasized every line and bump of his skull structure. He wore a double-breasted blue suit, black shoes, a starched shirt whose collar was easily three sizes too large, revealing a wrinkled neck. I counted six furrows between his eyebrows.

“The first thing I did was hand him two long Coronas, which I excavated in Helsinki. His eyes sparkled and he grabbed me with both arms, saying ‘Cigars from America, cigars from America.’

“We sat down in easy chairs around the table and drank real coffee and cognac in sherry glasses. Sibelius asked for a large glass so his shaking hands wouldn’t spill the cognac. The glass never came. He said he had one bottle of whiskey left, but was saving it. He had great difficulty lighting the stump of a Finnish Balkan tobacco cigar.

“I asked daughter Katarina, who was acting as watchdog, if it was possible to get Sibelius outside before sunset. He was very willing. He walked in the woods and sat on a bench near a stone wall.

“Sibelius told me he listens frequently to the radio and so keeps in touch with current music. ‘I heard the Leningrad Symphony and I feel Shostakovich has very great talent,’ he said.

“One subject he declined to discuss was his own recent work. His last work of any importance was published in 1929. Everyone is waiting for his eighth symphony. He wouldn’t talk at all about this; he said, ‘I am my sternest critic. I won’t discuss work I may discard.’

“When asked about Negro music, he said, ‘They give everything, they open their hearts.’

“I said, ‘What about jazz?’

“He said, ‘If I were only younger!’ “