Kalevi Aho: Timpani & Piano Concertos Turku Philharmonic Orchestra, Erkki Lasonpalo & Eva Ollikainen

• Timpani Concerto: Kalevi Aho (1949- ):
• 1 I. Barcarola 10:29
• 2 II. Intermezzo. Andante 04:09
• 3 III. Allegro ritmico 06:38
• 4 IV. Mesto 03:24
• 5 V. Presto 03:33
• Piano Concerto No. 1:
• 6 I. Allegro 11:34
• 7 II. Quarter Note = 72 06:32
• 8 III. Quarter Note = 69 - Toccata. Allegro molto 06:33
• 9 IV. Quarter Note = 54-58 06:35
• Total Runtime 59:27

Info for Kalevi Aho: Timpani & Piano Concertos

Hugely productive, Kalevi Aho (b. 1949) has composed close to 30 concertos to date. These include works for traditional solo instruments – piano, violin, cello … – but also more unusual ones, such as the theremin or accordion. One project of Aho's is to write concertos for all of the instruments of the symphony orchestra, from the flute to the contrabassoon, and in 2015 the turn came to the timpani. The work was commissioned by the Turku Philharmonic Orchestra for its timpanist Ari-Pekka Mäenpää, and Mäenpää and Aho worked closely together during the writing process. The result is a concerto that explores the instrument's full potential, from the melody opening the concerto, which lasts more than thirty bars, to the rhythmically compelling third movement.

Composed almost 30 years earlier, Piano Concerto No. 1 reflects the composer's interest at the time in numerology, and specifically in so-called cyclic numbers. The colourful and exciting work is however anything but cerebral. Soloist is Sonja Fräki, who chose Aho's music for piano as the subject of her doctoral studies, and whose recording of the solo works (BIS-2106) was released to great acclaim in 2015. With the two works on this disc, no less than 16 concertos by Aho are available from BIS, in recordings that have been praised by reviewers worldwide, and received distinctions including the prestigious ECHO Klassik Award.

Ari-PekkaMäenpää, timpani
Sonja Fräki, piano
Turku Philharmonic Orchestra
Erkki Lasonpalo, conductor (Timpani Concerto)
Eva Ollikainen, conductor (Piano Concerto)

Turku Philharmonic Orhestra (City Orchestra)
is the oldest orchestra in Finland and one of the oldest in the world. The roots of the Turku Philharmonic Orchestra stretch back to the year 1790 and the founding of The Musical Society in Turku. The orchestra was municipalized in 1927. At present the Turku Philharmonic Orchestra is the fifth largest in Finland with its 74 players.

Sonja Fräki
(born 1977 in Helsinki) is an actively performing concert pianist. She is also an experienced and sought after accompanist and chamber musician. Fräki studied at the Sibelius Academy and graduated as Master of Music 2003. She also studied in Germany at the postgraduate study programme called Konzertexamen in Karlsruhe and graduated 2004 with highest marks. Fräki has specialized in the piano music of Kalevi Aho, which was the topic of her Doctoral studies at the Sibelius Academy. She graduated as Doctor of Music 2016.

2008 Fräki won the 3rd Prize at the International Liszt Piano competition in Wroclaw, Poland. She was the winner of 4th Prize at the International Schubert Competition in Dortmund 2003. In Dortmund she also received a special prize for the best performance of Schubert late sonata in the semi-finals. She received prizes also at the Maj Lind competition in Helsinki 2007 and Paderewski competition in Poland 1998.

Fräki has performed as a soloist with various orchestras, for example Lahti Symphony Orchestra, Turku Philharmonic Orchestra, Pomeranian Philharmonic Orchestra and Neue Philharmonie Westfalen. She has also released two solo albums, the latest one for BIS containing the entire solo piano repertoire of Kalevi Aho. Musicweb International named it as the Recording of the Month in March 2015.

Fräki works as an accompanist at the Sibelius Academy and at the Music Institute Juvenalia.

Ari-Pekka Mäenpää
started playing percussions at the Western Uusimaa Music Academy with Pauli Hämäläinen. He studied professionally at Helsinki Conservatory and continuet at the Sibelius Academy with Markku Hannola, Lassi Erkkilä and Mongo Aaltonen as his teachers. He graduated in 1999 with honors. He has also studied in Berlin and Milan.

He started working as an assisting musician and substitute during his study years, and has worked with most of Finland’s professional orchestras, e.g. the radio symphony orchestra, the National Opera’s orchestra and the chamber music orchestra Avanti!. As a chamber musicians he has performed at the most important festivals in the country. He started playing in the Turku Philharmonic Orchestra in 2001, first as percussionist and later as the principal for timpani. He has also been a teacher as Western Uusimaa Music Academy and Turku Conservatory.

Erkki Lasonpalo
A decade after he was invited to study with the Finnish conducting guru Jorma Panula, Erkki Lasonpalo is making a name for himself as a conductor who combines fluent technique with natural communicative spirit. After tutoring from Panula, Erkki continued his studies at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki with Leif Segerstam, where he was awarded a Wegelius Foundation grant and graduated with the highest honours.

Since 2012, Erkki has conducted most of the major orchestras in Finland including the Helsinki, Tampere and Turku Philharmonic Orchestras and the Lahti, Oulu and Kuopio Symphony Orchestras. He has also been engaged by the City Orchestras of Lappeenranta, Vaasa, Pori, Jyväskylä and Joensuu as well as the Tapiola Sinfonietta and the Lapland Chamber Orchestra. Erkki has augmented his growing experience in opera by working with the orchestra of the Finnish National Opera and Ballet and with Oulu Opera, Savonlinna Opera Festival and Sakari Oramo’s West Coast Kokkola Opera Company. Outside Finland, Erkki recently made a successful debut with the Iceland Symphony Orchestra in Reykjavik.

Erkki is currently Artistic Director of the Heinävesi Music Festival, a post he has held since 2014. Since 2016 has been Artistic Director of the Kemi City orchestra, and since 2017 he has held the position of Artistic Partner of the Mikkeli City Orchestra. He is also the artistic director of the Helsinki Sinfonietta.

Like many of the most distinguished Finnish conductors working globally, Erkki laid the foundations of his musicianship as a professional instrumentalist. He studied violin at the Sibelius Academy and remains a member of the prize-winning Postiglione String Quartet. He signed to Nordic Artists Management in 2017.

Eva Ollikainen
The young Finnish conductor Eva Ollikainen impresses with her natural authority and infectious enthusiasm as well as with her elegant and nuanced technique, whether it be in orchestral concerts or leading operatic performances.

Following her recent success leading The Magic Flute at the Royal Swedish Opera, Carmen at the Gothenburg Opera as well as numerous symphonic programmes, the conductor is looking forward to debuts with the Finnish Radio Symphony and Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra, where she will conduct Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9. She has also been invited back to conduct the Finnish National Opera in Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker, Royal Swedish Opera in Mats Ek’s Julia & Romeo and various productions at the Semperoper Dresden, including the premiere of 100C° with choreography from Peck, Kylián and Schecther. Her complete Beethoven symphony cycle with the Jönköping Sinfonietta will also continue. At the beginning of the 2018/19 season Eva Ollikainen will become artistic director of the Nordic Chamber Orchestra, based in Sundsvall in Sweden.

Her decision to pursue a career in conducting was reached as a young student at the Sibelius Academy, where she studied with Leif Segerstam and Jorma Panula and also trained as a pianist. At the age of 21 she won the international Jorma Panula Conducting Competition and subsequently worked with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Kurt Masur as well as the Philharmonia Orchestra and Christoph von Dohnányi as part of the Conducting Academy of the Allianz Cultural Foundation. Also important was the instruction she received from Bernard Haitink, Herbert Blomstedt and James Levine as a Conducting Fellow of the Tanglewood Music Center.

She has subsequently developed a comprehensive repertoire with a focus on the great German symphonies, and continues to work with the leading Scandinavian orchestras such as the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, Swedish Radio Symphony, Copenhagen Philharmonic, Turku Philhramonic and the Lahti Symphony. In addition, she is also a frequent guest conductor of the Staatskapelle Dresden and has received invitations to lead the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra, the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Brussels Philharmonic and the Kennedy Center Opera House Orchestra.

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