*Satu Paavola - Sigismond Thalberg (Presence Records) [Full Album]

Satu Paavola (b. 1980) is a Finnish pianist. She started taking piano lessons at the age of four, first privately with Liubow Obmolotkova, later with Michal L. Zielinski, Eva Poutanen, Meri Louhos and Prof. Matti Raekallio. Satu Paavola graduated as a Master of Music from the Helsinki Sibelius Academy in 2004. After graduation she completed her education with a Soloklasse Konzertdiplom at the Hanover University of Music, Drama and Media in 2011. Since 2008 Satu Paavola is also a postgraduate student at the DocMus doctorate department at the Sibelius University. Satu Paavola has gained prizes in national and international piano competitions and she has performed in various concerts and festivals in Finland and abroad.

Satu Paavola’s wide solo repertoire consists of diverse piano music from baroque to contemporary styles. She has also shown a special interest in rarely performed piano repertoire of the 19th century. Her debut piano recording (released in 2012) consists of Sigismond Thalberg’s (1812—1871) piano fantasies based on bel canto operas. The following year, in 2013, Satu Paavola released her second piano recording of Charles-Valentin Alkan’s (1813-1888) solo piano works. One of the characteristics in Satu Paavola’s musical path is a great admiration for classical singing and opera. Simultaneously with her pianistic education she has studied singing. The interest in singing aspects in pianist’s work appears also in the subject of her doctoral studies at the Sibelius University: “Sigismond Thalberg and the influences of Italian bel canto singing”.