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Mika Pohjola – pianist (b. 1971, Helsinki, Finland)

is a Finnish-born jazz pianist and composer, who resides in Stockholm, Sweden. He was based in New York for seventeen years, 1995-2012. He is also one of the most prolific Scandinavian jazz musicians in his generation, and a distinguished piano artist on the Steinway & Sons roster. Pohjola was born in Helsinki, Finland, and grew up in the neighboring city of Vantaa. He received his formal education in a Steiner school, where his first instrument was violin. He then studied drums, and in 1979 piano and basic music theory with his father, Heikki Pohjola (1938-2020), who was a notable Finnish jazz guitarist in the 1960s. In 1981, young Pohjola entered the Helsinki cathedral boy choir, Cantores Minores under the direction of the German immigrant, Heinz Hofmann. The following year, Pohjola entered the Vantaa Conservatory in classical piano, music theory, counterpoint and composition. He also started playing jazz, and improvise freely. His early classical influences were Claude Debussy, Edvard Grieg and Johann Sebastian Bach, and some Finnish prominent composers, such as Aarre Merikanto. Pohjola was introduced to the music of Art Tatum, Charlie Parker and Oscar Peterson by his... Read