Elina Vähälä

Violinist Elina Vähälä has a large repertory that emphasizes contemporary music. She performed at the 2008 Nobel Prize ceremony. Vähälä was born on October 15, 1975, in Iowa City, Iowa, but returned to Finland with her parents as a small child. She took up the violin at age three, studying at the Lahti Conservatory; there, she studied with Seppo Reinikainen and Pertti Sutinen, and at the Kuhmo Violin School, her teachers were Zinaida Gilels, Ilya Grubert, and Pavel Vernikov. At 12, she made her debut with the Lathi Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Osmo Vänskä. During the...