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)
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.”This is the emotional and stylistic versatility which Rantala brings to the live solo recital. It is a form he is drawn to strongly; there can be very fe...
line upIiro Rantala / piano
Live in concert at Nikolaisaal Potsdam, 27.11.2021
Recorded, mixed and mastered by Martin Ruch
Cover art by Karl Horst Hödicke: Rotes Eck, 1979 © Deutsche Bank Collection (The World on Paper)
