Kari Kriikku

Kari Kriikku (born 1960) is a Finnish classical clarinetist.

Concentrating on contemporary music, Kriikku has served as an interpreter of works for the clarinet by  composers such as Olli Koskelin, Vinko Globokar, Kaija Saariaho, Jukka Tiensuu, Jouni Kaipainen, Kimmo Hakola, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Pawel Szymanski, Eero Hämeenniemi, Magnus Lindberg, Michel van der Aa, and Usko Meriläinen.

Early life
Kriikku was born near Seinäjoki, Finland into a musical family. His father was a trumpet player and a pianist; his mothers and sisters played the guitar and piano. Kriikku's first public performance was at a school end-of-term event, during which he and his father performed a piano four hands.

Kriikku left traditional school at age 16 to join the Helsinki Garrison Band, which required him to move into Army barracks. He later studied at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki. He continued to study with clarinetists Alan Hacker in England, and Leon Russianoff and Charles Neidich in the United States.

Career
Kari Kriikku co-founded the Avanti! Chamber Orchestra in 1983, and has served as the ensemble's artistic director since 1998.

Finnish contemporary classical composer Jukka Tiensuu wrote clarinet and orchestra concerto Puro (1989), and clarinet concerto Missa (2007) for Kriikku.

In 2002, composer Magnus Lindberg wrote his Clarinet Concerto specifically for Kriikku. The United States premiere performance took place in 2010, conducted by Alan Gilbert, with the New York Philharmonic at Carnegie Hall. The performance was praised by The New York Times, and Kriikku was described as "a player of Olympian virtuosity."

Kaija Saariaho wrote the clarinet part of her orchestra concerto D’om le Vrai Sens (2010) for Kriikku to perform. It was inspired by the six-panels of the 16th-century tapestries "The Lady and the Unicorn," with Saariaho conceiving the clarinet as the unicorn.

Kriikku gave the first performance of South Korean composer Unsuk Chin's Clarinet Concerto in  Gothenburg, Sweden in 2014. The piece received a mixed review from The Guardian, with music critic Andrew Clements writing, "it doesn’t seem to be the major addition to the clarinet repertoire that, for instance, the concerto that Magnus Lindberg composed for Kriikku in 2002 most certainly is."

In late 2015, Kriikku toured with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra under guest-conductor Miguel Harth-Bedoya.

Kriikku made his Minnesota Orchestra debut in March 2023, performing Saariaho's D’om le Vrai Sens (2010).

Kari Kriikku plays on Buffet Crampon RC Prestige clarinets.

Awards
His recordings of the concertos of Carl Maria von Weber was voted "best ever" recording by Classic CD and BBC Music Magazine.

In 2006, his recording of Magnus Lindberg's Clarinet Concerto (2002) won both BBC Music Magazine's Award and the Classic FM Gramophone Award.

He was the 2009 winner of the Nordic Council Music Prize: the prize committee wrote, "Kari Kriikku is an extraordinary virtuoso on his instrument, the clarinet. His performance is characterised by flexibility and a positive musician's joy – he is a musician in the best sense of the word."