Mari Mäntylä (CV)
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The Finnish guitarist Mari Mäntylä specialises in a rare type of classical guitar, namely the 10-string guitar or decacorde.
Her basic repertoire is drawn from different periods of classical art music, but she is a diverse musician and adapts easily to different styles of music. Such examples include her work with Finnish folk musicians and her playing as the guitarist in a band which plays Portuguese Fado music . Among the chamber music ensembles, in which she is involved the most active ones are a bandoneon-decacorde duo together with Kristina Kuusisto and a guitar duo with Hannu Annala.
She performs regularly both as a soloist and a chamber musician and she is engaged in collaboration with a number of composers from both Finland and abroad. Mäntylä has given several premiere performances of new music composed for the decacorde and thus she has contributed significantly in making this instrument better known to the public. Besides performing throughout Finland, Mäntylä has also given concerts in Estonia, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, France, Russia and Lebanon.
She has appeared in several recordings and performed on the radio and television in Finland, Russia and France. Mari Mäntylä is the guitar and chamber music teacher of the Kuhmo Music School. She was also the artistic director of the Tirando Guitar Festival, arranged in 2002 and 2003.
Mäntylä studied the guitar at Tampere Conservatory with Jorma Salmela, in the department of solo studies at the Sibelius Academy with Jukka Savijoki, in Oscar Ghiglia's concert class at the Basel Music Academy in Switzerland and at Accademia Musicale Chigiana in Siena, where she was granted a Diploma di Merito (an honorary diploma), in 1991. She took her soloist diploma at the Sibelius Academy in 1995 and Konzertreife diploma at the Basel Music Academy in 1997. She gained her Master of Music degree in 1998.
Mari Mäntylä's decacorde is constructed by Kauko Liikanen (Liikanen Guitars) in 2001.
Awarded grants and scholarships:
The Finnish Cultural Foundation, the Kainuu Regional Fund of the Finnish Cultural Foundation, the Jenny and Antti Vihuri Foundation, the National Council for Music, the Oulu Regional Arts Coucil, the Foundation for the Promotion of Finnish Music LUSES, Finnish Performing Music Promotion Centre ESEK, Finnish Composers' Copyright Society TEOSTO, the Madetoja Foundation, the Subcommittee for Public Lending Right Grants for Music, CIMO, Sibelius Academy.