Paavali Jumppanen
piano

Biography

Finnish pianist Paavali Jumppanen's New York debut in 2001 at the 92nd Street Y, presented by Young Concert Artists, garnered reviews of  “fresh and exciting” playing and “immense power and an extraordinary range of colors.”  Mr. Jumppanen has since toured extensively in the U.S. performing at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC and at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, where he has since his debut concert in 2001 performed frequently. His New York appearances have included performances at the Metropolitan Museum, Morgan Library and at Carnegie's Weill Recital Hall.  In 2002, he made his New York concerto debut with the New York Chamber Symphony conducted by Gerard Schwarz at Alice Tully Hall.

In January of 2007, Mr. Jumppanen embarked on a cycle of eight concerts over a period of two years at the Gardner Museum in Boston in which he performed the 32 Beethoven Sonatas.  The Boston Globe reported how “the sheer, overflowing energy of his musicianship held one’s attention throughout this impressive performance and the result was a bracing and enjoyable reminder of how path-breaking Beethoven’s music was.”  Jumppanen has since then repeated the cycle several times and in connection to the performances given lectures on the composer’s style.  He has also recently begun the process of recording the complete Sonatas by Beethoven as well as preparing for publication a book concerning the evolution of the compositional style within the Sonatas cycle.  During the 2011-12 season Mr. Jumppanen is in residence at the Harvard University in Cambridge, where he will be concentrating in a research project for the Piano Sonatas book.

Jumppanen has performed the complete Piano Concertos cycle by Beethoven with the Symphony Orchestra of the city of Kuopio, Finland; and during the 2003-04 season, he performed the complete Beethoven Violin Sonatas with violinist Corey Cerovsek at the Gardner.  In 2007, the Swiss recording label Claves released the complete Sonatas for Violin & Piano by Beethoven performed by the duo.  The recording received the Midem Prize of Cannes in February 2008 for best chamber music disc of the year.  During the 2010-11 season, Mr. Jumppanen performed the complete Piano Sonatas by Mozart at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, as well as in three different cities in Finland.

During the 2011-12 season, Mr. Jumppanen will perform recitals in Beijing, Berlin, and at the Messiaen Festival in La Grave, France.  His concerto performances during the 2011-12 season include appearances with the Lahti Symphony Orchestra conducted by Osmo Vänskä as well as with the Tapiola Sinfonietta conducted by Susanna Mälkki.

Mr. Jumppanen’s recent concert tours have included those in North America with the Hungarian Symphony Orchestra under Andras Ligeti, and with the Czech Symphony Orchestra under Theodore Kuchar.  He has also performed as soloist with the Melbourne Symphony and the West Australian Symphony Orchestra in Australia, Helsingborg Symphony Orchestra in Sweden, Orchestre des Concerts Lamoureux at Theatre des Champs Elysees de Paris, Orchestre de Cannes in France, Rochester Philharmonic, Pasadena Symphony, Stuttgart Philharmonic, Prague Symphony Orchestra, Oslo Philharmonic, Belgrade Philharmonic, Basel Symphony, Columbus Symphony, Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra and the New World Symphony in Florida.  Mr. Jumppanen has often performed and recorded with BBC Symphony Orchestra in London, most recently in the spring of 2010, when he performed the Grieg Piano Concerto under Jiri Belohlavek.

Winner of First Prize in Finland's national Maj Lind Competition in Helsinki at the age of nineteen, Mr. Jumppanen has since performed as soloist with all of Finland's orchestras, and he frequently appears with the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Helsinki Philharmonic, Tapiola Sinfonietta and the Lahti Symphony Orchestra.

Paavali Jumppanen frequently gives solo recitals and has performed numerous times in the prominent concert halls of Paris, New York, Vienna and London.  He has appeared at numerous international music festivals, including the La Roque d'Antheron Festival in France, Kitayushu Chamber Music Festival in Japan, Oslo Chamber Music Festival in Norway and at the Kuhmo Chamber Music Festival in Finland, where he is a regular visitor. Mr. Jumppanen also served a two-year post in 2004-05 as the Artistic Director for Finland's Lemi-Lappeenranta Music Festival.

Born in 1974 in Espoo, Finland, Paavali Jumppanen began to play the piano at the age of five at the Espoo Music Institute, where he studied with Marja Huhtamaki and Katarina Nummi.  He studied at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki with Margit Rahkonen, and has performed in master classes for Murray Perahia, Dimitry Bashkirov, Pascal Devoyon, and Eero Heinonen.  From 1997-2000 he worked with Krystian Zimerman at the Music Academy of Basel in Switzerland, where he was awarded the Soloist Diploma with the highest possible awards.

In addition to the Viennese Classical and Romantic repertoire, Mr. Jumppanen frequently programs the classics of the avant-garde as well as contemporary works, and regularly commissions works from Finnish composers.  He has worked with Henri Dutilleux on the composer’s Piano Sonata.  Deutsche Grammophon released in 2005 his recording of the complete Piano Sonatas of Pierre Boulez, which received prizes in France and Germany and earned the praise of London’s Guardian, which called it “the best recorded disc of Boulez’s piano music so far.”  Having worked with Pierre Boulez himself, Jumppanen has become a celebrated advocate of Boulez’s music.  Mr. Jumppanen also frequently performs the large cycle for solo piano, Vingt Regards Sur l’Enfant Jėsus by Olivier Messiaen.  His performance of the work at the Gardner Museum in Boston in 2010, subsequently selected as one of the top ten performances of the year by the Boston Globe, was reported by the Boston Globe to be “a rare wedding of intellectual penetration, coloristic imagination, and sheer virtuoso firepower.”