Beatles goes Kokkola
Vaasa City Orchestra
cond. Jussi Lampela
Markku Veijalainen, host
The Vaasa City Orchestra visits Kokkola with its popular Beatles program, joined by Markku Veijalainen, an expert on 1960s pop culture. The evening will feature fascinating stories and, above all, rich arrangements from the songbook of Liverpool’s Fab Four.
“It’s quite an experience to hear a large orchestra play familiar songs. My role, is to tell the stories and backgrounds behind each song. Hits like Yesterday, All You Need Is Love and Here Comes the Sun sound completely new, and the stories bring a fresh perspective to the listening experience,” Veijalainen promises.
Veijalainen’s first encounter with The Beatles wasn’t love at first sight. In a record review he wrote in 1963, he stated that the band wouldn’t amount to anything.
“A couple of months later, when I heard All My Loving, I realized I had made a huge mistake,” Markku laughs.
Since then, he changed his mind completely, and when Veijalainen got his own youth music program on Sävelradio, almost nothing but The Beatles was played on air.
In Kokkola, Veijalainen will introduce fourteen Beatles songs representing all stages of the Fab Four’s career. During the sing-along numbers, the audience will also get a chance to warm up their vocal cords.
An unforgettable Beatles concert awaits — the show sold out in Vaasa. So make sure to get your tickets early!
Program
All My Loving
Hard Day’s Night
Yesterday
Norwegian Wood
Eleanor Rigby
When I’m Sixty-Four
The Food on the Hill
-Intermission–
All You Need Is Love
Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds
Blackbird
Here Comes the Sun
The Long And Winding Road
Octopus’ Garden
Hey Jude
Comp. John Lennon, Paul McCartney
Arr. Jussi Lampela, Ralf Nyqvist
Artists
Jussi Lampela, conductor
Jussi Lampela is a composer, arranger, and guitarist from Helsinki, who has lived in Kokkola since 2017. Over the past fifteen years or so, his main work has consisted of various composition and arrangement projects for different ensembles, including concerts, recordings, films, and television.
Lampela’s ensemble, Jussi Lampela Nonet, has been active since 2010, with Lampela as composer and leader. The Nonet’s joint album with trumpeter Jukka Eskola, Lampela X Eskola (Ricky-Tick Records, 2010), was nominated the same year for an Emma Award in the category of Jazz Recording of the Year. In 2018, the live album Live at Kanneltalo was released, documenting a concert series at Kanneltalo in Helsinki, and in 2020 a digital release featuring two tracks was published.
In September 2022, the album Jazz Noir was released — a collaboration with the Turku Jazz Orchestra, composed for big band and two soloists. That same autumn, the Jussi Lampela Ensemble also released its debut album. Lampela is currently preparing a new album together with Teppo Mäkynen and Jukka Eskola. The record will be released in autumn 2025 (Eclipse Music / Tapio Ylinen).
Lampela also works regularly with orchestration and arrangement of film music.
Markku Veijalainen, host
Markku Veijalainen is a seasoned media professional with extensive experience in television, radio, and print production. His career began in the 1960s with music programs at Yleisradio (the Finnish Broadcasting Company), and since the 1970s he has worked as an entertainment journalist, program director, editor-in-chief, and TV producer for several major Finnish media outlets, including MTV, Apu and Katso magazines, as well as Radio Ykkönen. Since the 2000s, Veijalainen has worked as a freelancer through Cimiez Oy, producing, among other things, MTV’s program Studio 55.