Osmo Vanska

Conductor Osmo Vänskä has been the longtime music director of the Minnesota Orchestra, with a vigorous conducting career in Europe and Asia as well. He excels in the music of Sibelius and other Scandinavian composers, but also Beethoven, Mahler, and other continental European music of various periods. Vänskä was born in Sääminki, Finland, on February 28, 1953. Though he studied conducting under Jorma Panula at the Sibelius Academy of Music in Helsinki, his initial focus there was the clarinet. For the first part of his career, Vänskä was an orchestral clarinetist, first with ...