Felix Elmeri Zenger [1] (born 23 December 1986 [1] in Turku, Finland [2] ) is a Finland-Swedish beatboxer and multiple freestyle footbag Finnish champion. Zenger formed the Iiro Rantala New Trio together with Iiro Rantala and Marzi Nyman. Zenger joined the Don Johnson Big Band in 2018. [3]
Zenger was born in Turku on 23 December 1986, but spent his childhood in Kilo, Espoo. Zenger's father is the rector of a musical school and his mother is a teacher of the English and French languages.[ citation needed ] Felix Zenger is one of the three children in the family. In Espoo Zenger started at the language immersion class at the Revontuli school lower primary school, as his parents wanted their children to learn Swedish. When Zenger was ten years old the family moved to the Vasaramäki district in Turku. Zenger has been practising music and sports since his childhood.
Felix Zenger became familiar with footbag in Turku when the sport was making its way to Finland. According to his own words he became more interested in the sport than his friends did and started practising alone. [4]
Zenger has been competing in the Finnish championships in footbag since 2002 and won a gold medal from 2003 to 2006. He has also participated three times in the world championships from 2003 to 2006. He won a bronze medal in the world championships in 2005, which was also the first medal for Finland in the world championships in freestyle footbag. He also won a bronze medal in the European championships in 2005. He also participated in the European championships in 2003.
Zenger has also participated in other competitions in the sports, such as the circle, 3 trick combo and shred competitions. Of these, he has won four gold medals in the Finnish championships and two in the world championships, two silver medals in the world championships and one bronze medal each in the Finnish, European and world championships.
In 2003 Zenger participated in the Finnish championships in footbag net in the four-player series and won a bronze medal together with his pair Joona Koistinen.
Zenger has played the piano after his parents' recommendation since his childhood. At first he played classical piano music, but after he went to the Turku Academy of Music he switched to jazz and rhythmic music. In 2006 Zenger started studying piano playing in the Pop & Jazz Conservatory in Helsinki. [4]
Zenger started practising beatboxing at the age of 16. According to his own words, he had never heard the North American pioneers of the genre, but instead started mimicking the sounds of different instruments on his own and later also mixed them. Zenger only became familiar with the hip hop music culture through beatboxing. [5] [4]
Zenger has said that one of the reasons he became interested in beatboxing was that he was interested in playing the drums in his childhood, but did not want to start practising another instrument along with the piano. Playing the sounds of the drums with his own mouth did not require buying expensive instruments. According to his own words, Zenger can mimic about one thousand different sounds or their combinations. [5]
Zenger has appeared and recorded with many different artists. Among them are hip hop artists such as DJ QBert, Paleface, Giant Robot and Asa, and also other artists such as Pekka Kuusisto, Severi Pyysalo, Rajaton and Kari Tapio. [6] Zenger has also been a regularly featured artist at performances by the Don Johnson Big Band and has appeared on the band's third album. In 2007 Zenger was awarded best artist of the year 2006 at the Funk Awards. In the same year his skills became internationally known when he appeared as part of the introductory performance of the Eurovision Song Contest.
Zenger was a regular member in the Iiro Rantala New Trio which published its first album in 2008, together with Iiro Rantala and Marzi Nyman. The cooperation between Zenger and Rantala started when the rap artist Paleface recommended Zenger to Rantala.
In 2010 Zenger appeared at the Pori Jazz festival when Pharrell Williams of N.E.R.D. suddenly invited him on stage in the middle of their performance. Williams told the audience he had seen Zenger's YouTube videos and become impressed by his skills.
Zenger's first solo album Won't Say a Thing was self-published on 20 April 2011 [7] and was produced by Kari Saarilahti from the Don Johnson Big Band. The album reached place #21 at The Official Finnish Charts. [8] Zenger has been making his own songs since 2007. [4] He also appeared in the Summeri TV show in spring 2011 beatboxing at the Bysis youth café in Oulu.
Giorgio Armani has also requested Zenger's beatboxing in a lipstick commercial. [9] In 2015 Zenger appeared in Indonesia at several clubs and taught at a beatboxing workshop. At the time he appeared at the morning show of the Indonesian TV channel NET together with the band Art of Tree.
The music of Finland can be roughly divided into folk music, classical and contemporary art music, and contemporary popular music.
Kingston Wall was a psychedelic/progressive rock group from Helsinki, Finland, originally formed in 1987. Influenced by such artists as Jimi Hendrix, Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd, the group combined eastern themes, mysticism and vivid psychedelia with acid rock. The band consisted of Petri Walli, Jukka Jylli and Sami Kuoppamäki. Walli took the most active role in the band. He formed the group, composed most of the songs and wrote all the lyrics. He was also Kingston Wall's producer and manager and ran the band's own Trinity record label.
Ismo Kullervo Alanko is a Finnish musician. He is known as the frontman of several bands, most famously Hassisen Kone, Sielun Veljet and Ismo Alanko Säätiö, as well as a successful solo artist.
Jyrki Sakari Kukko, is a Finnish musician.
Zen Café was a Finnish rock band that was founded in Turku in 1992. The band derived its name from the book Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig at the suggestion of band's bassist Kari Nylander. Other original members were Samuli Putro, Mikko Oesch (guitar) and Tuomo Mäkipaavola (drums). Oesch soon left the group and Mäkipaavola was replaced by Pete Parkkonen (drums). Their latest album Stop was released in 2006, after which the band began a long hiatus without officially disbanding. According to Putro, it is unlikely that the band will ever return as Zen Café.
Bernhard Henrik Crusell was a Swedish-Finnish clarinetist, composer and translator, "the most significant and internationally best-known Finnish-born classical composer and indeed, – the outstanding Finnish composer before Sibelius".
Iiro Rantala is a Finnish jazz pianist. He studied piano in the jazz department of Sibelius Academy and classical piano at the Manhattan School of Music. He is one of the best known Finnish jazz pianists, both in Finland and abroad. Rantala is a pianist and composer with Trio Töykeät, a Finnish jazz trio. In addition to jazz, he has composed some classical pieces, most notably the Concerto for Piano and Concerto in G♯ΔA♭.
Pekka Kuusisto is a Finnish musician.
Hannu Markus Virta is a retired Finnish professional ice hockey defenceman. He was named the best defenceman in the Finnish Elite League (SM-liiga) four times, and was a five-time all-star. He also won the Jarmo Wasama memorial trophy as rookie of the year in 1981–82.
The Baltic Sea is crossed by several cruiseferry lines. Some important shipping companies are Viking Line, Silja Line, Tallink, St. Peter Line and Eckerö Line.
Varre Vartiainen is a Finnish guitarist who has studied in Helsinki Pop & Jazz Conservatory and Sibelius Academy of Music under supervision of Raoul Björkenheim, Jukkis Uotila and Wayne Krantz. He rose to fame and leading guitarist position in Finland playing in every possible connection; live concerts, studio sessions, movies, television shows and theatre musicals among them.
Ulf Karl Erik Wakenius is a Swedish jazz guitarist, known as a member of Oscar Peterson's last quartet from 1997. He was also a member of the Ray Brown trio.
Lasse Mellberg, better known by his stage name Redrama, is a Finnish rapper. He made a breakthrough in 2003. Redrama, who performs primarily in English, but also in Swedish and Finnish was part of a hip-hop group Alien Allies which also included the Norwegian Paperboys and Madcon. Redrama won the English-language Finnish championship of rapping in 2001 and he also won the Finnish Grammy (Emma) award for The Best Hip Hop Album in 2005.
Cantores Minores is a choir of the Helsinki Cathedral, and Finland's oldest and most successful boys' choir. The patron of the choir is the President of Finland. The choir consists of around three hundred 4- to 25-year-old boys and young men.
Erkki Pohjanheimo is a Finnish television producer and director.
ACT is a German record label founded in 1992 by Siegfried Loch. It is a division of ACT Music + Vision founded by Loch and Annette Humpe in 1988. ACT started as a pop music label but folded soon after it started. Loch turned it into a jazz label, at first reissuing music he had recorded for Liberty, Philips, and WEA before turning to new recordings.
The following is a list of notable events and releases of the year 2017 in Finnish music.
Jukka Perko is a Finnish saxophonist.
Tie Vapauteen is an album by the Finnish rapper Paleface and the band Laulava unioni, released in Finland at the end of November 2019. It contains newly recorded versions of Finnish-American industrial folk music songs.
Janne Juhani Mertanen is a Finnish classical pianist. He has studied at the Joensuu Conservatory under Matti Haapasalo and at the Sibelius Academy as a student of, among others, Erik T. Tawaststjerna. The pianist, who specializes in Chopin, made his debut at London's Wigmore Hall with a Chopin program in 1994.