Iiro Rantala

Iiro Rantala, Jazz at Berlin Philharmonic – Veneziana (2023) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · July 6, 2023 · Comments off

Our Jazz subscription Jazz at Berlin Philharmonic is already celebrating its 10th anniversary this season. The program of the birthday season starts with a tribute to a key figure of European jazz who died early: the Polish pianist and composer Krzysztof Komeda. Since Joachim Kühn met Komeda at the famous Jazz Jamboree in Warsaw in 1965 and then accompanied him to the recording studio, he has been one of his admirers. Now he remembers this visionary solo, in a trio with Chris Jennings and Eric Schaefer, as well as with the Polish Atom String Quartet.

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Leszek Mozdzer, Iiro Rantala, Michael Wollny – Jazz At Berlin Philharmonic VII: Piano Night (2017) [Official Digital Download 24bit/48kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · May 23, 2023 · Comments off

“Three men, three pianos, one emotion – jazz”. These were the words with which German national TV news succinctly summed up the piano summit on 31st May 2016 in a sold-out main hall of the Berlin Philharmonie. And the TV news reporter continued: “Iiro Rantala, Leszek Możdżer, Michael Wollny. Each in a class of his own. Together, they’re a miracle”. Is there perhaps an element of déjà vu in this story? Yes, certainly. Because these were the same three jazz piano greats who had performed at the very first ‘Jazz at Berlin Philharmonic’ in December 2012, the event which triumphantly set in motion the concert series curated by Siggi Loch at the German capital city’s classical music shrine.

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Jukka Perko, Iiro Rantala – It Takes Two to Tango (2015) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · April 22, 2023 · Comments off

With only five and a half million inhabitants in an area as big as Germany, Finland is one of the most sparsely populated countries in Europe. At the same time, the Finns are at the forefront of many fields – be it education, design or technology – and a good number of their European neighbours regard the North with some envy. The signs are pointing to a bright future for Finnish jazz as well: alongside pianist Iiro Rantala, Jukka Perko is considered to be one of the most important ambassadors of Finnish jazz. Born in 1968, he was hired to the “Dizzy Gillespie 70th anniversary big band” at the tender age of 20, with which he toured intensively through Europe and the USA before collaborating with legends of Bebop and Hardbop such as Red Rodney and McCoy Tyner and Scandinavian icons like Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen.

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Iiro Rantala, The Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen & Jonathan Bloxham – Playing Gershwin (2020) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · March 14, 2023 · Comments off

The time of rigid demarcations between musical genres is over. For those who see music, indeed who love music as a universal language offering unlimited scope for human expression, this can only be a positive development. When one considers the jazz pianists of our time, they have just about all received their grounding in classical music, and yet these are musicians who don’t just traverse many different jazz styles, they can also roam at will into other genres. And looking among them, it would be hard to find a pianist as quintessentially complete as Iiro Rantala from Finland.

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Iiro Rantala, Lars Danielsson, Peter Erskine – Lost Heroes (2011) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · March 14, 2023 · Comments off

Until now his name has been mainly associated with Trio Töykeät, one of the wildest, funniest and most visionary piano trios in the international jazz scene. Finnish pianist Iiro Rantala explored all possibilities of this classic line up – sometimes the ferocious player with boundless energy, other times the sensitive romantic or burlesque joker. His playing exceeded stylistic boundaries and was as uncompromising as it was entertaining, yet was always held together by the combination of limitless technique, a sense of humour and unmistakable good taste – qualities which Rantala preserved even after he dissolved Trio Töykeät in 2006. “My goodness! We’ve been doing this for 18 years now and given thousands of concerts. It’s time for a break,” he said at the time, choosing to concentrate on “Iiro at large” – his own show on Finnish television which can still be seen today – and his solo career.

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Iiro Rantala with Lars Danielsson & Peter Erskine – How Long Is Now? (2016) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · March 14, 2023 · Comments off

This new trio album with Peter Erskine (drums) and Lars Danielsson (bass) constitutes a many-faceted summing-up of a happy and resoundingly creative phase of Rantala’s life.

“Avoid the basic concept of the jazz piano trio and make it more groovy, with simple melodies” Iiro Rantala

After the album “My Working Class Hero,” dedicated to John Lennon and “Tears for Esbjörn,” a homage to the influential Swedish pianist, “How Long Is Now?” puts the spotlight fairly and squarely back on to the Finnish pianist, composer and life-force Iiro Rantala. This new trio album with Peter Erskine (drums) and Lars Danielsson (bass) constitutes a many-faceted summing-up of a happy and resoundingly creative phase of Rantala’s life.

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Iiro Rantala with Adam Baldych & Asja Valcic – Anyone With a Heart (2014) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · March 14, 2023 · Comments off

The classical form of piano trio is unfamiliar in jazz spheres – but, for Finnish pianist/composer Iiro Rantala, Polish violinist Adam Baldych and Austrian cellist Asja Valcic (all classically trained), it seems the perfect grouping to animate these jazz originals from Rantala.

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Iiro Rantala & Ulf Wakenius – Good Stuff (2017) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · March 14, 2023 · Comments off

Vienna, Rome, Seoul… Iiro Rantala and Ulf Wakenius are musicians who travel the world, always on tour as leaders of their own projects. So it was something of a fluke that this duo was able to come into existence at all. The idea first emerged in October 2015, when Rantala and Wakenius stopped off at the Philharmonie in Berlin. Siggi Loch, curator of the “Jazz at Berlin Philharmonic” concert series, had brought them together on stage for the “Tears for Esbjörn” concert. “We were part of a larger ensemble on that occasion”, Rantala remembers, “but it was clear to both of us straight away that we would want to form a duo.” This has to be seen as a very smart move, given the rarity of the piano-guitar duo in jazz – a fine exception being that of Brad Mehldau with Pat Metheny.

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Iiro Rantala – My Working Class Hero (2015) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · March 14, 2023 · Comments off

A jazz tribute to John Lennon. With his solo piano versions of the music of John Lennon and The Beatles, the Finnish pianist Iiro Rantala succeeds in preserving the soul of these timeless, immortal songs while at the same time adding something totally new to them.

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Iiro Rantala – My History of Jazz (2012) [Official Digital Download 24bit/88,2kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · March 14, 2023 · Comments off

A unique melody-based mixture of the most diverse atmospheres: On “my history of jazz” Iiro Rantala presents his very own view of the evolution of jazz. With his special combination of humour, intelligence and “almost limitless techniques” (German radio station hr2) he frames the album with compositions by Bach.

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Iiro Rantala – My Finnish Calendar (2019) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · March 14, 2023 · Comments off

Each piece on “My Finnish Calendar” represents a month of the year, and each also exists as an independent artistic statement. And if the storyline might not always be directly apparent from the music, Rantala has provided explanations and hilarious anecdotes in his liner notes. The sheer strength with which all this inspiration has been bubbling up becomes clear right at the beginning of the year.

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Iiro Rantala – Mozart, Bernstein, Lennon (Live) (2018) [Official Digital Download 24bit/48kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · March 14, 2023 · Comments off

Jazz pianist Iiro Rantala’s remarkable live album proves that barriers between musical genres needn’t exist. Electrifying performances of his own works, including the thrilling Freedom for prepared piano and orchestra, sit cheek-by-jowl with Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 21. The latter is played with glorious swagger, Rantala’s own ingenious first-movement cadenza, by turns dream-like, witty, and charming, proving a brilliant foil to Mozart’s perfect artistry. The album is bookended with another genre-busting set: Bernstein’s overture to Candide, two of Rantala’s own pieces, again arranged for orchestra and piano, and a mesmerising solo fantasy on John Lennon’s Imagine.

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Iiro Rantala – Potsdam (Live) (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · March 13, 2023 · Comments off

Iiro Rantala - Potsdam (Live) (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz] Download

Iiro Rantala plays the piano with “emotional magnetism and musical intelligence”; he has a “virtuosic prowess as an improviser capable of enormous idiomatic and emotional range.” (Downbeat) This praise from the American magazine’s review of the Finnish pianist’s third and recent studio-recorded solo album for ACT, “My Finnish Calendar” (2019) sums up the astonishing variety which people who know his playing well might almost start to take for granted. The citation for the 2016 JTI Jazz Prize in Trier also does well to define the way audiences take him to their heart: “Rantala can sweep listeners off their feet, he can be clown and magician, charmer and virtuoso, maverick and humorist.”
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