Sibelius: Works for Violin and Orchestra (Includes Six Humoresques)

Hybrid/SACD - playable on all compact disc players

MARBECKS STAFF RECORDING OF THE YEAR 2006

"A pupil of the Sibelius Academy and mentor Miriam Fried, violinist Pekka Kuusisto (b. 1976) plays excellently spirited Sibelius on his classic 1752 Giovanni Battista Guadagnini instrument. A strong component of the aural delight to be found on this sonically splendid disc comes from its January 2006 recording in surround sound, whose separation of solo and jaunty accompaniment the opening Six Humoresques proves spectacular..."Conductor" Kuusisto insists he merely plays the violin along with his compatriots in Swanwhite. Whatever his instrumental contribution, the total effect warrants my recommending this disc for Best of the Year honors"
(Audiophile Audition)

Born in Finland in 1976, Pekka Kuusisto began to study the violin with Géza Szilvay at the age of three. In 1985, he went on to study with Tuomas Haapanen at the Sibelius Academy. He also studied with Miriam Fried and Paul Biss at Indiana University in Bloomington from 1992 to 1996. He embarked on an international career after winning the Jean Sibelius Violin Competition in 1995. He has since performed with many of the world's major orchestras, such as the Chicago Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Philharmonia Orchestra, the Royal Philharmonic, the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, the Czech Philharmonic, the Stockholm Royal Philharmonic, the Deutsches Symphonie Orchester Berlin, the Australian Chamber Orchestra and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. Conductor champions include Valery Gergiev, Yuri Temirkanov, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Osmo Vänska, Paavo Berglund, Thomas Dausgaard, and Leif Segerstam. Apart from his appearances as a soloist, Pekka Kuusisto also performs chamber music, jazz, folk music and electronic music. Together with his brother Jaakko Kuusisto he is Artistic co-Director of the Lake Tuusula Chamber Music Festival.

Pekka Kuusisto has an exclusive recording contract with Ondine. His acclaimed first disc, Jean Sibelius's Violin Concerto with the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra under Leif Segerstam, was released in 1996 (ODE 878-2). He has also recorded Vivaldi's The Four Seasons with the Virtuosi di Kuhmo (ODE 939-2), the complete Violin Concertos of J.S. Bach with the Tapiola Sinfonietta and Jaakko Kuusisto (ODE 980-2), a disc containing works by Olli Mustonen conducted by the composer (ODE 974-2), Mozart's Violin Concertos nos. 3, 4 and 5 with the Tapiola Sinfonietta under Olli Mustonen (ODE 1025-2), as well as works for violin and piano by Sibelius accompanied by Heini Kärkkäinen (ODE 1046-2). Pekka Kuusisto plays a Giovanni Battista Guadagnini violin (1752) kindly lent by the Finnish Cultural Foundation.