Unlike many of Kaija Saariaho’s other works Terra Memoria has no electronic extensions but uses the traditional String Quartet to explore the mutability and changelessness of memories of ‘thosedeparted’. Kaija Saariaho is a contemporary Finnish composer living and working in Paris and considered to be part of the so-called ‘French Spectralist’ school of composition. She gained international renown forher first opera l’Amour Du Loin and continues a prolific compositional life with a wide range of international performances.