b i o g r a p h yr e p e r t o i r er
e v i e w sw e b s i t ewrite
to ManagerElina Vähälä, violinist
..
.
|
b i o g r a p h yr e p e r t o i r er
e v i e w sw e b s i t ewrite
to Manager |
Elina Vähälä, violinist |
|
b i o g r a p h y...........back to roster....up June 2012 “In Sibelius’s Violin Concerto, the playing of Elina Vähälä -- was a continuous stream of virtuosity, hushed at certain times, heroically brave at others. The cadenza was stunning in its control of diverse elements and the danse macabre of the finale was a tour de force of marrying technique with a joy of life.” -Classical Source, 2012 “The violin concerto was dazzling, with sublime playing from Elina Vähälä, whose strikingly beautiful musicianship was set against a shimmering background. With rises and falls, light and shade, it was the highlight of the evening.” -Shropshire Star, 2012 Violinist Elina Vähälä is one of the sought-after instrumentalists in the international music scene and receives praising critics for her performances all around the world. She made her orchestra debut at the age of 12 with Sinfonia Lahti and was later chosen as Sinfonia Lahti’s “Young Master Soloist” by the conductor Osmo Vänskä. She is the winner of the 1999 Young Concert Artists International Auditions in New York and her New York debut concert the same year received acclaim in The New York Times. Some of the highlights of the current season are appearances with the Turku Philharmonic Orchestra and Dalia Stasevska, Vancouver Symphony Orchestra and Tania Miller, Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra and Jean-Marie Zeitouni and Nashville Symphony Orchestra and Leonard Slatkin as well as performances in numerous festivals, including Four Seasons Chamber Music Festival, Spring Light Chamber Music Festival, and Kempten and Storioni Festivals. Past seasons have taken Elina Vähälä on stages all around the world: she has performed with the Minnesota Orchestra, Colorado Symphony and Simon Bolívar Youth Orchestra, as well as at the MIAGI festival in South Africa and on tours in China and South Korea, to name but a few. In December 2008 Vähälä performed at the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony and concert when president Martti Ahtisaari was awarded. The ceremony had a worldwide television broadcast. Elina Vähälä’s repertoire ranges from baroque to contemporary music. She has given world premieres of Aulis Sallinen's Chamber Concerto and Curtis Curtis-Smith's Double Concerto, both written for her and pianist-conductor Ralf Gothóni. In addition, the Scandinavian first performance of John Corigliano’s Violin Concerto “The Red Violin” has also been given by her. In the spring 2012 Vähälä gave the world premiere to Jaakko Kuusisto’s Violin Concerto, which she had commissioned. She is not only a soloist, but a devoted chamber musician too and has been performing e.g. with Andras Adorjan, Juri Bashmet, Ana Chumachenco, Chee-Yun, Peter Csaba, Itamar Golan, Ralf Gothóni, Ivry Gitlis, Bruno Giuranna, Gary Hoffman, Steven Isserlis, Frans Helmerson, Cho-Liang Lin, Adam Neiman, Arto Noras, Jean-Yves Thibaudet and Alisa Weilerstein. Besides being a musician, Elina Vähälä is also involved in the educational aspect of music. In 2009 she launched the Violin Academy – a master class-based educational project for selected, highly talented young Finnish violinists. The Academy is funded by the Finnish Cultural Foundation. Additionally, Vähälä is a professor of violin at the Hochschule für Musik in Karlsruhe. Born in the United States and raised in Finland, Elina Vähälä began to play the violin at the age of three at the Lahti Conservatory and over the years studied also under the guidance of Zinaida Gilels, Ilja Grubert and Pavel Vernikov at the Kuhmo Violin School. In Sibelius Academy Vähälä studied with Tuomas Haapanen and in 1998 she attended classes of Ana Chumachenco in Munich.
|
. r e p e r t o i r e...........back to roster....up
KALEVI AHO ALEXANDER ARUTIUNIAN JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH SAMUEL BARBER BÉLA BARTÓK LUDVIG VAN BEETHOVEN JOHANNES BRAHMS BENJAMIN BRITTEN MAX BRUCH ERNEST CHAUSSON JOHN CORIGLIANO CURTIS CURTIS-SMITH EINAR ENGLUND RALF GOTHÓNI JOSEPH HAYDN NIGEL HESS FELIX MENDELSSOHN-BARTHOLDY WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART SERGEI PROKOFIEV MAURICE RAVEL MIKLÓS RÓZSA CAMILLE SAINT-SAENS AULIS SALLINEN ESA-PEKKA SALONEN PABLO DE SARASATE ALFRED SCHNITTKE JEAN SIBELIUS IGOR STRAVINSKY PJOTR TSAIKOVSKY PETERIS VASKS RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS ANTONIO VIVALDI KURT WEILL HENRYK WIENIAWSKI
|
. r e v i e w s...........back to roster....up The Washington Post "Music from France often gets labeled as vaporous, perfumed abstraction. But as violinist Elina Vähälä played Fauré and Debussy at the National Gallery of Art on Sunday evening, the prevailing image wasn't mist -- it was fire. Throughout the program, Vähälä displayed a fondness and talent for hard, fast passages and was impressive not just for her technical proficiency but also for her ability to make them musically and emotionally potent. in Debussy's Sonata for Violin and Piano in G Minor, she teased out playful, mischievous and sensual lines, and in Fauré's Sonata for Violin and Piano No. 1 in A, she was all ardent, jealous romance. The concert closed with Stravinsky's "Suite Italienne", quick crowd-pleasing dances from his neoclassical ballet "Pulcinella", which earned both performers their standing ovation." (with Mika Rännäli, piano, 04/08) .................................................................................................... www.IncidentLight.com "Vähälä invested great care in details of color, inflection and dynamics, giving each note and phrase a weight and shape specific to its place in the whole. That specificity was especially effective in the Debussy, but also in the Stravinsky, whose neoclassicism is often rendered more generically. Vähälä's impeccable aim gave Copland's triadic melodic intervals a chiseled character." (Tuesday Musical Club of San Antonio 03/08) .................................................................................................... The New York Times “Her control of phrasing, and especially the ends of phrases provided evidence of a thoughtful musician who has all the technical accomplishment and confidence she needs to project her thoughts. Her intonation is sure and her tone fine, perfectly formed. In her highly musical performance of the Brahms’s D minor sonata her delicacy of sound and the rythm in the third movement was marvelous, as was the drive in the finale. She breathed each movement, and even the whole sonata, as one.” ................................................................................................... Le Droit, Ottawa “This concert was of exeptional quality. Elina Vähälä’s playing is expressive, sensitive and tempestuous...intense and smooth sound, impeccable intonation, a lively bow arm, all with an easy mastery, a clarity of sonority when each note bursts with life and each phrase leads to the next. Fiery temperament, brilliant and pure playing - in a recital like this one feels that there is a guaranteed future for music.” ................................................................................................... Ottawa Citizen “There was a high level of energy, a careful but passionate attention to detail and a high sense of music’s technical and emotional structure. In Schubert’s Duo for violin and piano one was constantly struck with the suppleness and sheer beauty of the violin sound.” ................................................................................................... Westdeutche Allgemeine Zeitung (WAZ) “...an utterly brilliant interpretation of the work.” ( A. Schnittke: Concerto grosso nr.1, soloists Elina Vähälä and Katrin Scholtz, violins) ................................................................................................... Le Monde “Impeccable accuracy, a sound that sang, radient and luminous; this young woman shows herself to be a soloist of the highest rank whose ease and presence place her among the rising glories of the violin.” (Mendelssohn: Double concerto for violin and piano ) ................................................................................................... The Seattle Times “Vähälä, a Grace Kelly look-alike who cut an exceedingly glamorous figure on the stage, took over as soloist for two Beethoven Romances for Violin and Orchestra. She is a patrician, confident player with a big, smooth tone that poured out the long-lined melodies with true beauty.” ................................................................................................... The Seattle Post “Vähälä has almost a viola depth and richness to her violin sound. Her Beethoven was sensitive, musical and appropriately classical in style.” ................................................................................................... Seesener Beobachter “She understood wonderfully how to X–ray the structure of this concerto. Her playing was about great beauty and at the same time uncommonly simple. [In the finale] she played with great temperament. Marvellous passages and jumps, magical flageolettes and everything in general was mastered by the sympathetic soloist Elina Vähälä.” (Sibelius:Violin concerto) ................................................................................................... Svenska Dagbladet, Stockholm “Elina Vähälä's playing was blinding, answering to all the demands of the music in power, virtuosity and soft melancholy. A pure and poetic feeling in the violin tone and fiery involvement in the interpretation. Yes, it was absolutely brilliant...” (Kalevi Aho: violin concerto) ................................................................................................... LA Times, Los Angeles “Vähälä was clearly the evening's star and the Schnittke her showpiece. Both violinist and pianist threw themselves into the sonata...Vähälä offering a vividly athletic performance that managed to appear untamed but was, in fact, perfectly in control.” (Schnittke: Quasi una sonata) ................................................................................................... Seattle Post Intelligencer “Vahala, who has performed with the orchestra before, gave a fine performance of the Mozart concerto, with the orchestra closely attuned to her. Gothoni's and Vahala's was an elegant, modern rendering, and clean technique and keen musicianship marked her playing.” (Mozart: Violin concerto No.5) ................................................................................................... Charleston Gazette, Charleston WV “She consistently opted for a measured approach, always thoughtful, always probing. The first movement was nearly transparent in texture yet still painted with gorgeous tonal colors. The finale had the same clarity, but with ample wattage added to the playing when needed. Indeed Vahala kept adding heat to her playing toward the end drawing some astonishing powerful sounds from her 1678 Stradivarius.” (Mendelssohn: Violin concerto E minor, 03/2007) ................................................................................................... Daily Mail, Charleston, WV “Violinist fiddles like the devil, and the results are heavenly Finnish violinist Elina Vahala uses her 1678 Stradivarius violin as a musical weapon. Felix Mendelssohn's violin concerto is fiendishly difficult from a technical standpoint and gives a soloist the opportunity to either sink or swim many times throughout the three-movement work. Vahala's handling of the work proves her Olympic style of swimming in a giant pool of musical sharks -- and never once did she receive a bite. Moreover, the work is intensely musical, as Mendelssohn's music usually is, which allowed the superb orchestral accompaniment to tease Vahala into singing like an angel while fiddling like the devil.” (Mendelssohn: Violin concerto E minor, 03/2007) |
| N E W S R O S T E R C O N T A C T L I N K S |