Anni Haapaniemi

I come from Toholampi, a tiny rural municipality in Central Ostrobothnia where as recently as in the 1980s there were more cows than people. I was a farm girl, and in my childhood I knew about as much about oboe solos as a pig knows about a windmill.

Toholampi has a robust musical tradition. I began singing in a choir and playing the piano when I was barely knee-high. The community has had an active wind band for more than 40 years; it has fostered some 30 professional musicians and countless music enthusiasts in the course of its history. At the age of eleven, I was so keen to join the wind band that I started learning the oboe at the suggestion of the band conductor.

The hobby started to morph into a career; I was still in middle school when I had the opportunity to perform with the Ostrobothnian Chamber Orchestra alongside my teacher Regina Hamarikivi. I have retained a close and meaningful relationship with the orchestra ever since.

After attending the music upper secondary school at Kaustinen, I went on to study at the Sibelius Academy and then in Gothenburg, Geneva and Paris. In 2003, I got my first orchestral job with the Tampere Philharmonic. I then played with the Helsinki Philharmonic before landing my dream job with the Tapiola Sinfonietta. Orchestral repertoire contains a wealth of oboe solos, some soaring over a string background and others bubbling along as part of a woodwind texture. I enjoy both.

Chamber music is also important to me, and I particularly enjoy playing Baroque and Classical oboe. In my free time, I can be found spending time with my children or otherwise being busy at home with handicrafts or unread books. There is time enough to carve mouthpiece reeds at night.