CAREER HIGH LIGHTS

For those who really are interested... ;-)

 

In 1980 I won the European Championship in Frisbee Ultimate. Big win against England at the finals in Paris! I also graduated the same year from Sibelius Academy.  1981 I got a seat in Settlement Big Band in Helsinki. I stayed for a good 15 years with that great Big Band. Our leader was Petri Juutilainen, my child hood friend. We shared great moments with guys like e.g.  Mario Grillo. The same year I joined Broadcast and got my first record deal with Finlevy. 1983 first gold album Who's Got The Ball. Same year won the Battle of the Bands at Guild Hall, Preston, England. I also started my studio career at the same time, and got to play with some great artist and conductors on numerous albums and TV- shows like: Toivotaan Toivotaan, Anteeksi kuinka? Pöllölaakson Aarre, Syksyn Sävel, Kevään Sävel, Eurovision Song Contest (house band) and so on... 1984 joined Pave Maijanen's band. Toured and recorded 2 albums with him. Album Lähtisitkö (Would you?) was my first Platinum selling album. Joined Gringos Locos. Recored 3 albums for Polygram-Records. The Punch Drunk was produced by the late great Tom Dowd. With Gringos we toured all over Europe and U.S.A. My high light was definitely the support tour in England with Status Quo (my child hood heroes) and of course working with Tom Dowd!. We got to perform at places like Wembley Arena and Birmingham N.E.C. In 1986 I went to study at Drummers Collective N.Y. for 6 weeks. 1987 I joined Hector, a great Finnish singer/song writer,  recorded his gold selling Nuku Idiootti- album and did a tour around it. During this time I was working a lot at different studios and TV-shows. 1991 I moved to Los Angeles to study at the Musicians Institute. After the great year at P.I.T. I stayed in town for another year. First 4 months as an intern at the Zildjian office in LA. Great times! I got to meet and play with a lot of people. 1993 I moved back to Finland and joined Ben Granfelt Band. Recorded 10 albums with Ben (eight of them in my studios) and toured all over Europe.  We also did couple of support tours with e.g. Lynyrd Skynyrd and Thin Lizzy in Germany. One of my best memories are from the Lizzy tour; On one gig Tommy Aldridge couldn't come to the sound check, so Marco Mendoza (bass) calls me up on stage to sub Tommy. His drums are tuned to a really high pitch and he is using quite heavy stix. I playd as hard as I could to get a sound out of the drums (that I could hardly reach). I was so exhausted, that I couldn't almost play my own gig. Hah! Another lesson learned... I also started to teach more and joined the staff at Helsinki Pop and Jazz Conservatory. (for 10 years). 1994 I started to work a lot in different theatres, Arena Theatre, Helsinki (revy) 10 years in a row. Tampere Theatre (RENT, Boy Friend, The Apartment, West Side Story, Scarnet Pimpernel) and Helsinki City Theatre (Grease). And so the years go by playing different gigs and tours with Ben Granfelt, Jari Sillanpää, Kivikasvot, Pop Tenors, Laura Voutilainen, Anneli Saaristo, playing at musicals, more clinics for Yamaha and Zildjian, teaching at the conservatory, studio work (e.g. Angry Birds! That was fun!!!)... In 2005 I had a n honour to write music for the Helsinki  World Athletics Championship Opening ceremonies. 2011 I joined Erja Lyytinen's Band. We toured in Finland, Europe, Canada and England. I did 4 albums with her, 2 DVD's and tracks for BBC Maida Vale studios in London. 2014 Blues Caravan 5 week tour in Europe and England (CD/DVD). Engineerd Johanna Lehesvuori's Christmas album (coloratura soprano). It was nice to record some classical music for a change. Played drums and percussion on Markojuhani Rautavaara's new album. September 2014 I joined Laurence Jones Band and did What's it Gonna Be album. Toured all over G.B. and Europe e.g. Kenny Wayne Shepherd (support) and King King (support), Royal Albert Hall, (Lead Belly Fest.) Rory Gallagher Festival (Irland),  Puisto Blues (Finland), Skegness Blues Festival. In September 2015 I was voted "The Best In Blues" Blues Matters Writer's Poll No:1 International Drummer! In November I finally finished mixing the new Marko-Juhani's "Lauluja Käärmesaaresta" album. I really love his song writing. 2016 Back together with  Ben Granfel Band.  Starting to work on the new album soon...

That's all for now folks!!!    T.B.C. Cheers! -miri-