Artturi Rönkä (b. 1990), unarguably one of the youngest and most promising Finnish jazz pianists, has, despite his young age, an impressive CV already. Born in Helsinki, Rönkä started his jazz piano studies at Pop & Jazz Conservatory and the Junior Academy of Sibelius Academy, from where he was selected into the jazz department in 2009. He spent the academic year 2012-2013 in student exchange, studying music at Conservatoire de Paris (Paris Conservatory), in France.

Besides smaller groups, Rönkä has been playing in Junior All Star Big Band since spring 2008. Lately, however, he has been mostly employed by his own band, AR Quartet (Artturi Rönkä Quartet), which is formed by three other rising stars in addition to the maestro himself. AR Quartet won the Finnish qualifying heat for the inter-Scandinavian Young Nordic Jazz Comets competition in 2012, and ranked second in the international Jazz Hoeilaart competition in Belgium in September of the same year. The group’s eponymous debut came out in early 2014.

Rönkä has also made a name as an original and gifted composer. In April 2012 he won the international Jazzverk composition competition, organised by Norrbotten Big Band and Kungliga musikhögskolan in Luleå, Sweden. Also, in summer 2011 Rönkä came first in the Esko Linnavalli big band composition contest with his composition “By Rail”. The final was held in Imatra. This was not the first time he had participated in the contest or, indeed, made an impression on the jury; already in 2009 Rönkä received the third prize for his work “Wandering, wondering”.

ed. Annamari Innanen 31.3.2014