Anna Mustonen is a choreographer and dancer based in Helsinki. Since 2007, her works have been presented at stages and festivals for dance and performing arts. Her artistic practice is rooted in long-term, interdisciplinary processes that allow for reimagining ways of performing and collaborating. Mustonen is a member of the arts collective i dolci together with Marianna Henriksson, and the artistic community rendezvous. She holds a Master’s degree in choreography from the Theatre Academy Helsinki (2010) and a Bachelor’s degree in dance from Amsterdamse Hogeschool voor de Kunsten (2007).
Harpsichordist Marianna Henriksson performs as a member and soloist in several ensembles both in Finland and abroad. She enjoys working with a variety of musical genres and interdisciplinarity. Over the years, she has participated as a musician and music director in several dance and opera productions, premiered and recorded new harpsichord music, arranged folk music materials and participated in a world tour of a breakdance show. Since 2023, she has been a co-artistic director of the Finnish Baroque Orchestra.
Henriksson and Mustonen’s artistic thinking emphasises deep dialogue between practices and aims at an embodied listening. Their collaboration on early baroque music and contemporary dance started with a performance titled Di anima et di corpo (2012), and continued with Maria-vesper, a choreographed performance of Monteverdi’s Vespro della Beata Vergine (2018). Eros, a big-scale prodution (2022), was performed at Erkko Hall of Dance House Helsinki. Their most recent work, Sfäärit (2025), brought together contemporary music to contemporary dance, including music by Shiva Feshareki and premieres by Justina Repečkaitė and Lauri Supponen. All four works have been coproduced by Zodiak.
The starting point of Sfäärit (Spheres) is the concept of composition: how can a work be approached both as the ways in which sound is organised into music and as a reflection of the connections inherent in choreographic thinking?
Chords collapsing into one another, the movement of dust, a swelling organ sound, and the cosmic intervals of a meantone tuning system intertwine with centuries-old ideas about the harmony of the spheres – the sound produced by the movements of the universe and its vibrations in smaller units of nature, such as the human being.
In the performance, the dance immerses itself in the experientiality opened up by the music, gathers and expands, leaving space until it condenses, presses in, and fades into the air. The dance curls towards the intimate, expands into the environment, forming wondrous patterns and slight yet remarkable movements.
In Sfäärit (Spheres), we hear world premieres by Lithuanian composer Justina Repečkaitė and Finnish composer Lauri Supponen, who have worked on material for the positive organ and harpsichord in collaboration with Henriksson, Mustonen, and performers Anna Maria Häkkinen, Marlon Moilanen, Mira Kautto, and Petteri Pitko. Additionally, the performance includes For Marianna (2020), a composition by British-Iranian Shiva Feshareki for Henriksson.
Sfäärit (Spheres) premiered on February 2025, as a part of the Side Step Festival 2025 and Musica Nova Helsinki.
