In August 1913, Sibelius received a message from the American composer and Yale University professor Horatio Parker: a New England patron of the arts, Carl Stoeckel (1858–1925), and his wife, Ellen Stoeckel née Battell (1851–1939), had authorized $1,000 for the commission of a new symphonic poem from Sibelius, per Parker's recommendation. The piece, not to exceed fifteen minutes in length, was to be played at the 1914 Norfolk Music Festival in Connecticut, which the Stoeckels annually hosted (and financed) at their estate in a wooden performance hall dubbed "The Music Shed". Despite his ongoing struggles with another commission, incidental music to Poul Knudsen's tragic pantomime "Scaramouche", Sibelius accepted the Stoeckel offer, writing in his diary, "A symphonic poem, ready by April".