Tapio Tuomela (born 11 October 1958) graduated from the Sibelius Academy with diploma degrees in piano and conducting. He continued his piano and conducting studies in Soviet Union and his composition studies at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York receiving the Master of Music degree in 1990. At the Sibelius Academy his teachers were Eero Hämeenniemi, Magnus Lindberg, and Paavo Heininen, and he has also studied composition at Hochschule der Kunste in Berlin, at master classes by Witold Lutoslawski, George Crumb, Klaus Huber, Brian Ferneyhough and at the summer course of IRCAM in Paris.

Tuomela's works have been performed at several Finnish and foreign festivals including the ISCM World Music Days, the Nordic Music Days, UNM, the Gulbenkian Festival (Lissabon), Festival d'Ile de France and Festival Présences (Paris), Scandinavia Today and North&South Consonance (New York), the Moscow Forum and Sound Ways. His music has been in the repertoire of orchestras and choirs in Europe, and apart from festivals he has received commissions from the Finnish National Opera, the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Lahti Symphony Orchestra, Orkester Norden, the Finnish Radio Chamber Choir, the Joensuu City Orchestra, Ensemble Musicatreize, OrchestrUtopica and the Chamber Orchestra of Lapland.

Tuomela’s works have been placed among the recommended works of the Unesco Rostrum and he has received two prizes in the Finnish Independency composition competitions. His main works are the two operas (The Ear’s Tale and Mothers and Daughters), his two symphonies dating from 1993 and 2005 and his symphonic poems. His oeuvre also includes vocal works, such as Vuohenki Luohti (The Song of Vuohenki) for mezzo-soprano and orchestra. His works often have a connection to the Kalevala (e.g. Lemminkäinen, 2002) or Lapland’s nature and culture (Jokk, 1995). He has also written a Piano Conceto for Iiro Rantala in 2008. Tuomela has also composed choral music as well as several chamber and instrumental works which are popular repertoire of many a musician.

Tapio Tuomela’s portrait concerts have been held at the Helsinki Festival summer series and at the Finnish Institute of Paris. He was invited as a featured composer at the Nordic Music Festival in St. Petersburg in September 2005 and at the Festival Musiques Demésurées, Clermont-Ferrand in June 2006. In February 2005 he was awarded the Kalevala prize by the Finnish Kalevala Society. Tuomela is also active as a conductor. Since 2000 he has been the artistic director of the Time of Music Festival in Finland.

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