Photo: Heikki Tuuli

Sirkka-Liisa Kaakinen-Pilch

Sirkka-Liisa Kaakinen-Pilch is an exceptionally versatile violinist. She plays music from all ages, but her focus is mostly on the repertoire of 1600-1800s. She also plays viola and viola d’amore and acts as a concertmaster and a leader.

Sirkka-Liisa Kaakinen-Pilch has worked, among others, in these ensembles: Avanti!, Finnish Baroque Orchestra, Helsinki Baroque Orchestra, Battalia, 18th Century Orchestra (Frans Brüggen), La Petite Bande (Sigiswald Kuijken), Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra (Ton Koopman), Concerto Copenhagen (Lars-Ulrik Mortensen) Orchestre des Champs Elysees (Philippe Herreweghe). She has also been acting as a leader of Collegium Vocale (Philippe Herreweghe) for over ten years.

Today, she is working as a leader for orchestras of early music all over in Europe and is also conducting various philharmonic orchestras, with whom she performs repertoire mostly from baroque and classical eras. Her solo repertoire includes Biber’s 16 Mystery Sonatas, J.S.Bach’s works for violin solo, and a large amount of repertoire for solo violin from 16th and 17th centuries.

Sirkka-Liisa Kaakinen-Pilch has served as Professor of Chamber Music in Stavanger, Norway, as well as a Professor of Early Music at the Royal Conservatory of Denmark and the Bremen Art Academy. At present Sirkka-Liisa Kaakinen-Pilch is working as Visiting Professor of Early Music at the Kraków Music Academy and a lecturer of violin at Tampere University of Applied Sciences. For 2020-2021 she is also serving as an international visitor at the Department of Early Music at Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, where she also currently works as senior lecturer of violin. She has also been working at the European Union Baroque Orchestra and teaches on numerous master classes.

Sirkka-Liisa Kaakinen-Pilch’s discoraphy includes J. S. Bach’s Sonatas and Partitas for solo violin, H.I.F.Biber’s Mystery Sonatas with Battalia-ensemble and Ch. Graupner’s orchestral series as conductor of the Finnish Baroque Orchestra playing viola d’amore. In 2014, she released an album of Ch. Graupner’s triosonates (viola d’amore). Sirkka-Liisa Kaakinen-Pilch and Tuija Hakkila have recorded together the Sonatas by Thomas Byström. One of her most recent releases includes Christoph Graupner’s Epiphany Cantatas, where Sirkka-Liisa Kaakinen-Pilch is leading the Kircheimer Bach Consort playing violin and viola d’amore (December 2017). In April 2018, a record with the Ondine record label Johannes Brahms’ Violin Sonatas was released, with Tuija Hakkila and Sirkka-Liisa Kaakinen-Pilch playing on period instruments.