Donation Campaign

To celebrate the start of the organ project, the Helsinki Music Centre Foundation will organise a donation campaign. Our goal is to collect €200,000 and to guarantee an unfailing flow of live music for the new organ in the future.

The Helsinki Music Centre is a temple of music without a crown. The crown being an organ. An organ was on our shopping list for the Helsinki Music Centre opening ceremony in 2011, but the purchase was delayed then. But now it is finally happening!

Kaija Saariaho, one of the most noted Finnish contemporary composers, was the first to take action with a one-million-euro donation for the organ. Foundations willing to contribute and the Helsinki Music Centre owners (the City of Helsinki, the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture, and the Finnish Broadcasting Company YLE) followed suit.

In 2017, to celebrate the announcement of the organ acquisition for the Music Centre, the Helsinki Music Centre Foundation launched a donation campaign. Initially, the goal of the campaign was to support the unique construction project of the organ in the concert hall. Now the funds raised through the donation campaign will be used to produce music and events featuring the organ at the Music Centre.

One of the world’s most renowned contemporary composers, the late Kaija Saariaho, donated one million euros towards the purchase of the organ. This initiative was followed by additional funding from other foundations. The final go-ahead for the project was secured with the involvement of the City of Helsinki, the Ministry of Education and Culture, and the Finnish Broadcasting Company Yle.

Thanks to all the supporters of the campaign, the new organ, built by the Austrian organ builder Rieger Orgelbau, was inaugurated in January 2024.

Funds raised so far:

392060€

The Organ Q&A

Why now? Why wasn’t the organ built earlier?

A space for a concert organ was originally designed for the Helsinki Music Centre Concert Hall. For budgetary reasons, the building of a concert organ was delayed, and an electric organ has been used instead in the Concert Hall.

The Helsinki Music Centre already has three different organs, why yet another?

The Concert Hall houses an electric organ. The Organo Hall has three organs, but they are intended for practice and smaller concerts. Moreover, the existing organs represent different organ types.

Donation Campaign

The Organ Q&A

Why now? Why wasn’t the organ built earlier?

The Helsinki Music Centre already has three different organs, why yet another?

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