Module title
26.07. Vaskiviikko alkanut loistavilla konserteilla 22.03. Uusi kilpailu Lieksan Vaskiviikolla

Guest artists and teachers

 

Atso Almila has been Second Conductor of the Kuopio Symphony Orchestra since the autumn 2007 season.
He was Conductor of the Tampere Philharmonic 1987-89, of the Joensuu City Orchestra 1993-2000, of the Kuopio Symphony 1995-2000, and has been Principal Guest Conductor of the Seinäjoki City Orchestra since 2000. He has also taught orchestral conducting at the Sibelius Academy. A regular conductor in productions by Finnish opera associations, at the Finnish National Opera and with symphony orchestras, Almila has toured abroad mainly in Sweden, Ireland and Switzerland. In April 2007 he led the Wiener Jeunesse Orchestra on a tour of Austria. Almila has also composed four operas, two symphonies, works for wind band, concertos for various instruments, solo and chamber music for both strings and winds, and music for stage and screen. He has been the recipient of many distinctions in his native Finland.
 
 
Raine Ampuja studied the French horn, music theory and orchestral conducting at the Sibelius Academy from 1980 to 1988. He was Conductor of the Guards’ Band 1988-2006 before being appointed Chief of the Armour Band in Hämeenlinna. In 1993 he furthered his studies at the Royal Marines School of Music in England. A prolific and versatile composer, he has also made hundreds of arrangements. He has coached and conducted in various capacities in Finland and abroad for over 20 years and has written two textbooks on wind music. Chairman of the Finnish Wind Band Association and the Sibelius Weeks, he is also Editor-in-Chief of the Puhallinorkesteri Uutiset (Wind Band News) magazine established by him. Raine Ampuja was Finland’s Military Musician of the Year in 1995 and awarded the Klemetti Prize in 1996.

 
 
Ronald Barron was Principal Trombonist of the Boston Symphony Orchestra from 1975 until 2008. He joined the orchestra in 1970 after being a member of the Montreal Symphony Orchestra, and also served as Principal Trombonist of the Boston Pops for thirteen seasons. Mr. Barron is a graduate of the College-Conservatory of Music of the University of Cincinnati, where he studied with Ernest Glover. During his college years, he also toured with the American Wind Symphony.
 
Mr. Barron was a frequent soloist with the Boston Pops Orchestra and appeared with a number of New England area orchestras and bands. As a recitalist he has performed across the U.S., Europe and Japan. In addition to numerous recordings with the Boston Symphony and the Boston Pops, Mr. Barron has recorded and performed with the Canadian Brass, Empire Brass, and Summit Brass, and has nine successful solo recordings.
 
Mr. Barron has been a faculty member for the International Trombone Workshop and the Keystone Brass Institute, and teaches at the New England Conservatory of Music.  He formerly taught at Boston University and the Tanglewood Music Center. He is on the board of advisors for the International Trombone Association and has served on the juries for the international competitions of Toulon, France, and Munich, Germany. Mr. Barron received the 2005 ITA Award from the International Trombone Association. "In recognition of his distinguished career and in acknowledgement of his impact on the world of trombone performance."
 
Through his deep interest in wine Ron Barron has earned the level of “Certified Specialist of Wine” as awarded by the Society of Wine Educators.
 
 
Tom Bildo was only six when he began playing the cornet and the euphonium in his local Salvation Army boys’ band and later studied at the Sibelius Academy. While still a student he did gigs with ‘Baron’ Paakkunainen, followed by a decade or so in the ranks of the Linkola Octet. A major landmark in his career was the founding of the UMO Jazz Orchestra in the mid-1970s.
 
In 1977 he joined the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, playing bass trombone, transferring to the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra as principal trombone six years later. He has also been a member and leader of Töölö Brass. Since 2003 he has led the Karelia Wind Orchestra rich in tradition.
 
 
 
The Budapest Festival Horn Quartet founded in 1993 won the second prize in the 4th International
Brass Competition in Passau, Germany two years later. It has released two critically-acclaimed CDs: Cornologia (1996) and Cornologia 2 (2000). Miklós Nagy plays solo horn in the Luxembourg Philharmonic Orchestra, while László Rákos, László Gál and Tibor Maruzsa are all members of the Hungarian National Philharmonic Orchestra. The Quartet’s repertoire takes in almost all the main works for horn quartet and numerous arrangements of music ranging from the Baroque to the present day.
 
 
 
American trumpeter Joe Burgstaller has performed – both as a soloist and in ensembles – and taught all over the world, appeared numerous times on radio and TV and released a host of discs. A member of Canadian Brass for 7 years and the Meridian Arts Ensemble for 6, he continues to tour as a recitalist and concert soloist, with his jazz crossover BurgstallerMartignon4 in addition to holding clinics. He also teaches the trumpet and chamber music at the Peabody Institute. Joe began playing the cornet at age 6 and by 12 was already improvising jazz and gigging with local jazz bands. At 15 he was the youngest professional in the Virginia Opera Orchestra. He holds a Master’s degree from Arizona State University and has studied with David Hickman, Anthony Plog, Stephen Carlson, Jonathan Greenburg, Gary Gompers and David Fedderly.
 
 
The New York City-based BM4 (BurgstallerMartignon4) vaulted into the top 50 US Jazz-Radio Charts in the Spring of 2009 starting with the very first week of their first release, "Mozart's Blue Dreams & Other Crossover Fantasies" (Summit Records). Their music combines Jazz and Classical into an organic hybrid that has simultaneously ignited the excitement of both Classical and Jazz fans alike.
 
The pioneers of the Crossover movement took music where it had never gone before, combining Jazz, Classical and many more styles, erasing boundaries and profoundly influencing the generations of musicians that grew up listening to their innovative cross-genre creations. As a result there now exists a new breed of musician, one who is comfortable and proficient in many styles and genres, capable of switching back and forth with ease, co-creating without limitation, all the while staying true to MUSIC and taking the audience on extraordinary journeys!
 
The BM4 are:
Joe Burgstaller - Trumpets (Soloist, Peabody Institute, ex-Canadian Brass & Meridian Arts Ensemble)
Hector Martignon - Piano (Grammy, Tony & Oscar nominated, Tito Puente, Celia Cruz, Paquito D'Rivera, Mambo Kings)
Hans Glawischnig - Bass (Grammy nominated, Chick Corea, Ray Baretto)
John Ferrari - Percussion (Naumburg Award, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center)
 
 
 
The Euphoria Brass Sextet was formed by euphoniumist Mizuho Kojima by rounding up brass players she thought would be fun to make music with. The present line-up dates from 2005, when its members began studying with Pasi Pirinen at the Sibelius Academy. The EBS nowadays works in periods, sometimes with vocalist Emilia Saarinen. Finding time to practise together is not always easy, because Miikka Saarinen plays the trumpet in the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Visa Haarala is (mis)leader of the Retuperän WBK student band, Jussi Järvenpää shines in the orchestra of the Finnish National Opera, trombonist Anna-Maija Laiho-Ihekweazu’s employer is the Turku Philharmonic, Mizuho Kojima freelances and teaches, and Aleksi Saraskari has found his dream job teaching low brass at the North Kymi Music Institute. They are, however, all determined to beat the geographical obstacles and continue playing together until kingdom come.
 
 
Francisco Flores studied at home in Venezuela and in France and is now Principal Trumpet in the Simón Bolivar Symphony Orchestra, with which he has had the opportunity to play in many international Festivals in South and North America, Italy, Germany, Austria and Spain. He has attended and taken masterclasses in Europe, the United States and Latin America and is a founding member of the Simón Bolívar Brass Quintet. Internationally he has soloed with the Venezuelan National Youth Orchestra in Venice, Italy with solo recitals in Spain and France. Francisco Flores is the first Latin American trumpet player to have won prizes in the most prestigious European trumpet competitions: 3rd in the 2005 International Trumpet Competition in Pilisvörösvár in Hungary; 1st in the 2005 Phillip Jones International Trumpet Competition in Guebwiller, France; 1st in the 2006 International Trumpet Competition in Paris plus the Special Prize for the best interpretation of the Commissioned Work by Salvador Chuliá Hernández, and 1st in the 2006 International Trumpet Competition Città di Porcia in Italy. He teaches at the Andean Conservatory in Tachira, Venezuela and was one of the founders of the National Trumpet Academy in Caracas.
 
Finnish Folk Brass
The idea of forming a Folk Brass (debut at Lieksa Brass Week 2010) ensemble arose on the back seat of a coach carrying Jouko (Harjanne) and Esko (Heikkinen) on a tour of Japan by the Guards Septet in December 2008. Their guiding principle was to delve into Finnish folk music and to do so in a new, virtuosic style with good players. There and then it was decided to rope in Jukka Myllys, sitting a few rows away.
In forming the line-up they wanted to see how two tubas would work together. The arranger would then have a freer hand to use fuller and more complex bass lines than with just one player. The same “duo line” was then applied to the rest of the band. In other words two euphoniums, French horns and trumpets. Trumpets: Jouko Harjanne & Esko Heikkinen; French horns: Jussi Järvenpää & Juuso Wallin; euphoniums: Jukka Myllys & Mizuho Kojima; tubas: Aleksi Saraskari & Harri Lidsle.

 
 
Lisa Ford is since 1993 the Principal Horn player of the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra. She was previously Assistant Principal Horn of the San Diego Symphony, Principal Horn of Baltimore Opera, and Co-Principal Horn of the Florida West Coast Symphony .
 
A graduate of the Interlochen Arts Academy, she has been a member of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, and has a degree in music performance from the Norwegian State Academy of Music.
 
Lisa has appeared as soloist and guest instructor on many occasions including appearances with the Gothenburg Symphony, Gothenburg Wind Orchestra, IHS conferences in Lahti, Denver, and Cape Town, Nordic Horn workshop and the horn classes at Lieksa Brass Week and Nove Strasice. An active chamber musician, Lisa is also a member of the modern music ensemble !Gageego!
 
Lisa Ford teaches horn at the Academy of Music and Drama at Gothenburg University, and is currently brass coordinator and horn advisor at the Swedish National Orchestra Academy (SNOA).
 
 
 
Tomas Gricius studied trumpet at the J. Naujalis School of Music in Kaunas, Lithuania and at the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre. He also studied at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London and at the Sibelius Academy of Music in Helsinki. He has attended several international master classes.
Tomas Gricius was the winner of J. Pakalnis National Wind Instruments Competition in 1987, 1992 and 1995. He also won the first prize in the 3rd International Raimo Sarmas Trumpet Competition in Lieksa in 2007. Tomas Gricius has given solo performances at various festivals with several Europian orchestras. He is also active as a chamber musician. His teaching experience encompasses work at the J. Naujalis School of Music, M. K. Čiurlionis School of Arts in Vilnius, and Summer music school in Trakai Fanfare Week. Tomas Gricius was working with the Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra in 1997-2005, and since 2006 he has been the 2nd solo trumpeter with Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra. In 2008 he was invited to play principal trumpet in the World Symphony Orchestra in Korea.
 
 
Jouko Harjanne studied the trumpet with Raimo Sarmas at the Tampere Conservatoire and continued after graduating with Henri Adelbrecht and Timofei Dokshitser. He began teaching at the Sibelius Academy at the age of 26 and has held a number of masterclasses in Finland and abroad. Between 1978 and 1984 he was alternate lead trumpet with the Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra; since 1984 he has been the solo trumpet player with the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra. He has gained success in international competitions, the most important being second place in the Prague Spring Trumpet Series in 1987, and first place in the Ellsworth Smith Trumpet Competition organised by the International Trumpet Guild in 1990. He has also been much in demand as a player and teacher at international brass events. In addition to his numerous recordings he has performed in many productions for radio and TV. Jouko Harjanne is the Artistic Director of the Lieksa Brass Week.
 
 
Trumpet player and conductor Esko Heikkinen started playing the trumpet in the Outokumpu Wind
Orchestra and as a young lad was doing gigs with his fatherìs dance band. In 1970 he began his professional career as a bandman in the Kontioranta Garrison Band and was the principal trumpeter for the Guards Band between 1975-83.

In 1976 Heikkinen became a member of UMO Jazz-Orchestra. Since 1990 he has had his own brass ensemble Super Brass. He currently conducts the Helsinki Police Band, and Helsinki Fire Brigade Band and teaches the trumpet at the Sibelius-Academyìs jazz department. Esko Heikkinen was awarded the prestigious Yrjö -prize of jazz music.
 
 
 
Paavo Heininen is a composer, essayist and pianist. A highly revered figure in Finnish musical circles, he is known as a prolific composer of chamber, vocal, piano and orchestral works and of two operas: The Knife and The Damask Drum. He also guided a generation of young composers at the Sibelius Academy during a teaching career of more than thirty years. His Adagio…concerto per orchestra in forma di variazioni…(1963/66) is regarded as a one of the cornerstones of Finnish dodecaphony. Heininen started exploring electro-acoustic music during the latter half of the 1970s and the potential of the computer in the early 1980s. His reconstructions of works by Aarre Merikanto, his former teacher, constitute a chapter in themselves. Vocal music is, however, perhaps closest to his heart because of his passion for texts: the marriage of word and music is, in his opinion, something unique, allowing the composer and the poet to express more together than they could ever do alone. During the 1990s his stylistic spectrum expanded, resulting in two "jazzy" works for big band (Wolfstock and Bookends,) and the Concerto for Piano and Orchestra No. 4 (2004-05). Heininen has also composed five symphonies.
 
 
Pianist Kari Hänninen graduated with distinction from the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki in spring 1996. Since autumn 1996 he has been an accompanist specialising in brass instruments at the Sibelius Academy, a répétiteur at the Finnish National Opera and keyboard player in the National Opera Orchestra.

He has been involved with brass instruments ever since he was 12, playing first the tuba and later the trumpet in the Lappeenranta and Imatra Big Bands, and accompanying brass players at concerts, for radio recordings, at competitions and festivals. All in all he has appeared in eleven European countries, the United States, Japan and Malaysia.

 

 
 
Senior Lieutenant Lassi Ikäheimo began his trumpet studies with Esa Ahonen and Erkki Eskelinen at the Lieksa Music Institute and in the Lieksa Youth Wind Orchestra in 1975. He then proceeded via the Sibelius Academy Military Music Department to the Guards' Band as trumpeter in 1984. Five years later he qualified as a trumpet teacher, having studied with Heimo Savolainen at the Helsinki Conservatory, and as an assistant conductor at the Military Music School.
Lassi Ikäheimo has made a name for himself as a champion of Finnish brass septet culture. On founding the Guards' Septet within the Guards' Band in 1988, his idea was to widen the potential uses of the Finnish brass septet and to make this, possibly the most Finnish of all line-ups, better known internationally.
 
 
Major (Mus.) Petri Junna has led the Karelia Military Band since autumn 2009, having qualified as a conductor in 2000 following studies with Kalervo Kulmala, Pertti Pekkanen, Atso Almila and Jorma Panula. He also has experience of conducting some of Finland’s other military bands, the Oulu Symphony Orchestra, the Joensuu City Orchestra and the wind band of the Lahti Conservatory, and of conducting and teaching at camps and various events. Petri Junna is also known for his wind arrangements, of such works as the orchestral suite The White Reindeer by Einar Englund, Mozart’s Requiem for soloists, chorus and wind orchestra, and numerous other, mostly Finnish works. In the course of his career he has also played the trombone in military bands and the Lohja City Orchestra.
 
 
 
Jussi Järvenpää studied the French horn with Sauli Orbinski and Seppo Parkkinen, from 2003
at the Sibelius Academy with Timo Ronkainen and in 2006-07 with Markus Maskuniitty at the University of Music and Drama in Hanover.
He has been a member of the horn section in the orchestra of the Finnish National Opera since August 2009, plays chamber music in the Sirius B Wind Quintet and the Euphoria Brass Sextet and the natural horn in early music ensembles. In addition to roaming the wilds of North Karelia he was a guest player in the Joensuu City Orchestra for the autumn 2008 season.
 
 
 
Kauko Karjalainen was introduced to brass instruments in the late 1950s. He began with the cornet and euphonium and later took up the trombone, studying with Pentti Yletyinen at the Oulu Music Institute before transferring to Olavi Lampinen in the late 1960s. He was one of the founders of the Finnish Trombone and Tuba Association. A researcher at the Academy of Finland 1984-85, Kauko Karjalainen obtained a doctorate from the University of Helsinki in 1991, having previously taught in the Department of Musicology at the Universities of Jyväskylä and Helsinki. He has written dozens of articles for Finnish and foreign publications, edited a book about the Finnish brass septet (Suomalainen torviseitsikko, 1995) and a 10-part radio programme on wind playing. He was Executive Secretary of the Finnish Music Information Centre 1977-86 and thereafter Head of the Music Library of the Finnish Broadcasting Company (YLE) until 2003. The 2008 season is his sixth as director of the international Lieksa Brass Week competitions.
 
 
The secret of the popularity of the Karelia Military Band is not difficult to guess, for in planning its concerts it allows for not only the different musical tastes of its audience but also of all special groups. Added to which, it combines the cheerful Karelian temperament with military bearing. Major target groups for the band are children and young people. The annual concert in Joensuu in early summer attracts youngsters to come and sing together, and the rock concert in Joensuu market place on the day the schools break up brings in thousands of people of all ages. In 2010 the Karelia Military Band will join forces for the first time with the Joensuu City Orchestra. Its performance in January of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition will be followed in the autumn with a project going by the name of Star Wars, and in February and November the band will be appearing with the Dragoon and the Savo Military Bands. The list of soloists ranges from light to classical – Paula Koivuniemi, Jarkko Ahola, Minna Pensola, Jaakko Ryhänen, Matti “Fredi” Siitonen and Matti Turunen. The Karelia Military Band is a unit of the North Karelia Brigade and stationed at Kontiolahti. Its conductor as of 2009 has been Major (Mus.) Petri Junna.
 
 
Mizuho Kojima began his musical studies with the piano when he was four and later took up the euphonium in order to play in the school band in Tokyo. He was a pupil of Toru Miura 1994-2002, except for 1996, which he spent as an AFS exchange student in Indonesia. While attending the Lieksa Brass Week masterclass in 2001, he got to know Jukka Myllys. On graduating from the Kunitachi College of Music Mizuho returned to Finland to study with this famous Finnish conductor, euphonium and trombone maestro. Winner of the 1st prize in the Lahti Wind Competition in 2003 and the 21st Japan Wind and Percussion Competition in 2004, he received a diploma with distinction from the Sibelius Academy in spring 2008. Mizuho plays chamber music with the Euphoria sextet and other ensembles.
 

Kalervo Kulmala was principal horn in the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra1972-1983. He carryied on the work of Holger Fransman at the Sibelius Academy in 1973 and has led the horns in the Savonlinna Opera Festival Orchestra since 1974. The Sibelius Academy appointed him Lecturer in brass music in 1988. From 2001 to 2007 he led the new training for brass conductors, having previously conducted many chamber orchestras and brass ensembles. He has also been the regular conductor of the municipal orchestras in Kouvola and Vaasa.
 
Abroad he is Professor at the Estonian Music and Dance Academy, Docent of the Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra and gives coaching in brass and especially the French horn to the Venezuelan Simon Bolívar Orchestra.
 
 
Sanna Kurki-Suonio is one of Finland’s most celebrated and renowned contemporary folk music artists. Soloist with the Swedish Hedningar ensemble and on their most highly-acclaimed CDs Kaksi (1992), Trä (1994) and Karelia visa (1999), she released the first disc of her own (Musta) in 1998 followed by another with kantele player Riitta Huttunen in 2004; all this has sent this magnificent singer and strong interpreter well on her way to an international career. Over the past couple of years she has developed a new band with Riitta Huttunen and multi-instrumentalist Jari Lappalainen. This trio has done gigs of its own and partnered the Tsuumi Dance Company in performances of Maamme laulut (Finnish Anthems). Since releasing her debut disc Sanna Kurki-Suonio has worked towards a doctorate in folk music at the Sibelius Academy.
 
 
 
 
 
Anna-Maija Laiho-Ihekweazu studied the trombone with Heikki Moisio at the Turku Conservatory and with Simo Kanerva, John Kotka and Teppo Alestalo at the Sibelius Academy, obtaining a degree in music in 2008. Four years playing in the ranks of the Guards’ Band then acted as a “high-altitude training camp” in the early stage of her career. She is now associate principal of the trombone section in the Turku Philharmonic Orchestra. Her teachers in various master classes have included Kristian Lindberg, Jacques Mauger, Michel Becquet, Jörgen van Rijen, Tony Baker and Yoshiki Hakoyama. Anna-Maija is a founder member of Ytybrass and Euphoria and can also be heard in the ranks of the Riverside Rascals, Saimaa and Warvin Wasket. She has taught low brass instruments in SW Finland and coached players in the Vivo Symphony Orchestra and at the Kymi Brass event.
 
 
 
Jeffrey Lang  performs and teaches French horn in the greater New York - Philadelphia area. He is currently Associate Principal horn of the Philadelphia Orchestra and Principal horn of the American Symphony Orchestra. Formerly Principal horn of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, Jeff has been invited as guest principal horn of the Bavarian Radio Orchestra, the New York City Opera Orchestra, and the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra. He has also performed with the New York Philharmonic and the Metropolitan Opera. Jeff has developed an active horn studio at Vassar College, and is currently on the faculty of Temple University and Bard College. He studied at the Juilliard School and Temple University. 
 
Jeff is a frequent soloist and has appeared with Zubin Mehta, Mung-Whun Chung, Kurt Masur and Leon Botstein conducting. Chamber music performances at home and abroad have included concerts with Bella Davidovitch, Diane Walsh, Simone Dinnerstein, The Israel Piano Trio, the Wister Quartet, Rolf Schulte, Melvin Chen, Richard Wilson, the Canadian Brass, and members of the Philadelphia Orchestra. He has participated in the Kingston Chamber Music Festival, Bard Rediscoveries, OK Mozart and the Spoleto Festivals. Jeff records for several TV, film, and commercial artists in the metropolitan area and was Principal horn of Disney's long running Broadway hit, Beauty and the Beast. He is an active member of the Recording Academy, the International Horn Society and the American Federation of Musicians. Jeff lives in New Jersey with his wife, Finnish cellist Elina Snellman-Lang, and their two sons, Johannes and Markus.
 
 
Founded in 1972, Lapland Chamber Orchestra is the most northerly professional orchestra in the European Union. It is a regional orchestra based on the town of Rovaniemi and gives performances both in the Province of Lapland and all over the arctic region and Finland. Often invited to such festivals as the Tampere Biennale, Viitasaari Time of Music, the Kaustinen Chamber Music Week, the North Norway Festival and the Korsholm Music Festival, it is a regular guest at the Luosto Classic event and has appeared in the Classics Series of the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra.
The orchestra frequently gives the Finnish premieres of works by composers of all nationalities and eras and the world premieres of music by many leading contemporary composers (such as Aulis Sallinen, Kalevi Aho, Pehr Henrik Nordgren and Jószef Sári).
Lapland Chamber Orchestra has been awarded distinctions by Finland’s TV1 (1998) and the Arts Council of Lapland (2000) and John Storgårds was the recipient of the culture prize of Rovaniemi and its rural district in 2000. TV1 also awarded its Vuoden Valopilkku prize for 2003 to the Luosto Symphony by Kalevi Aho premiered on Luosto Fell by Lapland Chamber Orchestra and the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra.
The latest disc by Lapland Chamber Orchestra, Rituals, of music by Kalevi Aho was released in March 2009 on the BIS label and  it was awarded the record of the Year by Finnish Radio.
 
 
Harri Lidsle has been with the Lahti Symphony Orchestra since 1990. He spent the period 2004-06 on
leave of absence as a freelance musician and teacher in Ostrobothnia, during which time he formed the Ostrobothnia Brass Band, the Seven Bridges Sinfonietta and FCTuba. As a soloist he has appeared with orchestras in Finland, Armenia, Australia, Iceland, Germany and Estonia, and with a pianist he has toured widely in Europe, the USA and Canada. Lidsle is known abroad above all for his partnerships with composers. He has commissioned or premiered over 20 works. Lidsle is also extremely well-known as a masterclass teacher and competition jury member in both Finnish and international arenas. In 1997 he was elected the Finnish Brass Player of the Year by Lieksa Brass Week.
 
 
 
Before taking over as conductor of Kemi City Orchestra, Jukka Myllys played the euphonium and was assistant conductor of the Pohja Military Band and was trombonist in the Oulu Symphony Orchestra. He obtained a Master’s degree from the Sibelius Academy in 1996, majoring in the euphonium, for which he is widely renowned. He has been the soloist in recitals, with most of the Finnish symphony orchestras and with symphony, professional wind and brass ensembles in many European countries and the United States. In addition to his orchestral commitments Myllys teaches at the Sibelius Academy, the Oulu University of Applied Sciences and the Oulu Conservatoire. He studied orchestral conducting with Kalervo Kulmala and Kari Tikka and has been conducting the Viventi wind orchestra, winner of a number of competitions, for many years. Jukka Myllys was Military Player of the Year in 1993, Brass Player of the Year in 1994 and Young Artist of the Year of the Province of Oulu in 1994.
 
 
Miklós Nagy graduated from the Ferenc Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest, where his teachers included Gyula Gergely, Imre Magyari and Ádám Friedrich, in 1986. From 1984 to 1988 he was Principal Horn in the Hungarian Symphony and thereafter until 1992 in the Hungarian State Symphony Orchestra. He held the same position in the Budapest Festival Orchestra 1992-2000 and since September 2000 in the Luxembourg Philharmonic Orchestra. He has also been a member of the Budapest Festival Horn Quartet and the Budapest Wind Ensemble. His international competition successes include 1st prize in Markneukirchen (Germany) in 1986 and Duino (Italy) in 1992. Three years later the Horn Quartet of which he was a member won the 2nd prize in Passau (Germany). Nagy was Professor of the French horn at the Musashino Academy of Music in Tokyo and the Tokyo Metropolitan Fine Arts and Music University 1996-1999. He has toured in Europe and Japan and appeared many times on Hungarian radio and TV.
 
 
Verneri Pohjola was 15 by the time he began playing the trumpet and later studied in the Sibelius Academy Jazz Department. In 2004 he was chosen as Young Musician of the Year by Pori Jazz and Musician and Trumpeter of the Year by the Jazzrytmit magazine critics. He has also won several prizes with the Ilmiliekki Quartet. Other line-ups in which he appears are Quintessence, Q-Continuum and Silvio. In 2009 he released his first solo disc, Aurora. He has guested with Warp! and the UMO Jazz Orchestra and played on CDs made by Pekka Pohjola, Jukka Gustavson, Tuomo Prättälä, Kerkko Koskinen and Kitkerät Neitsyet.
 
 
The Symphonic Wind Orchestra Sisu was founded in 2001 and works in periods with professional conductors. Its players come from all over Finland and all age groups, consisting of amateurs, professionals and vocational students. The orchestra has taken part in joint education and concert projects with a number of music events and colleges and last appeared at Lieksa Brass Week in 2002 and 2003. Occupying pride of place in the orchestra’s repertoire is new Finnish music for large symphonic wind orchestra. Sisu has launched a long-term project to commission a concerto for each of the orchestra’s instruments. The first were commissioned from Kirmo Lintinen (Horn Concerto, 2008) and Atso Almila (Oboe Concerto, 2009). At the closing concert of this year’s Lieksa Brass Week Sisu will premiere the Trumpet Concert commissioned from Esko Heikkilä with Verneri Pohjola as the soloist.
 
 
John Stevens is Professor of Tuba and Euphonium at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he is also a member of the Wisconsin Brass Quintet, a faculty ensemble-in-residence. He is in demand at conferences, festivals and universities around the world as a teacher, composer, performer, conductor and competition judge. Prior to joining the University of Wisconsin faculty in 1985, he was a successful freelance performer in New York City and subsequently taught at the University of Miami (Florida) where he also performed extensively in symphonic and opera orchestras. He has had a very diverse career as a chamber music and orchestral performer and recording artist, soloist and jazz musician, brass ensemble conductor and even administrator, having been the Director of the University of Wisconsin School of Music for five years. In 2008 he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Tuba and Euphonium Association.

John Stevens is world renowned as a composer and arranger, especially for brass. He has composed over 50 original works, many of which have been commissioned and premiered by acclaimed ensembles and solo artists including Gene Pokorny and the Chicago Symphony, Roger Bobo, Symphonia, and Brian Bowman among others.
 

 
 
John Storgårds has made a name for himself as both a violinist and a conductor. His work as Artistic Director of the Chamber Orchestra of Lapland has won him high acclaim, and he has successfully skippered several of the leading Finnish Symphony Orchestra orchestras as guest or chief conductor. A guest with the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra since 1994, he was the orchestra’s Principal Guest Conductor 2003-2008 and has been its Chief Conductor since autumn 2008. Storgårds has been Artistic Director of two musical events: the Korsholm Music Festival and LuostoClassic. At the Finnish National Opera he has conducted a number of critically-acclaimed productions, and he made his Savonlinna Opera Festival debut in 2000 in Mozart’s The Magic Flute. In July 2005 he made his well-received debut at the London Proms, conducting the BBC Symphony Orchestra. He now has a regular partnership with this orchestra and makes guest appearances with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, RAI Torino and the Danish Radio Symphony Orchestra at least once a month. John Storgårds the violinist can be heard on many discs – ten concerto CDs alone. He has been awarded many distinctions in his native Finland.
 
 
Trio Acustico Venezolano
Francisco “Pacho” Flores, trumpet; Jorge Glem, Venezuelan cuatro and Roberto Koch, contra bass.
 
  
 
 
Tuomas Turriago finished his masters degree at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki with distinction in 2004. He is now teaching in a music college in Tampere. Tuomas Turriago has won the 1st prize in a piano competition in Sweden in 1992 and the 2nd prize in Jyväskylä piano competition in Finland in 2001. He was also in the final of Ettlingen international piano competition in 1992. He has given recitals and performed with chamber music groups and orchestras in Finland and 6 other Europian countries, the Arabian Emirates, South Korea, Singapore, USA and Columbia.
 
Tuomas Turriago has composed music for piano, harp and saxophone, two string quartets and a chamber symphony. He has recorded actively for Finnish and international radio. From 2006 he has also been working as a conductor.