News - Finland: meet the lucky dozen | Eurovision Song Contest News - Azerbaijan 2012 

The Finnish selection process for the 2012 Eurovision Song Contest. UMK, Uuden musiikin kilpailu (The contest for new music) has revealed tonight the 12 artists going further, as well as the three fighting for the last audience wild card. Esctoday has prepared a small introduction for these 12.

The following acts were revealed tonight as the choices of the professional jury, and they go on to following week:

Aili - Mun taivas

Aili Järvelä comes from a musical family. Her collaboration with songwriter Jussi Petäjä started in 2010. The duo describes their music as melodic, mostly acoustic and based on classical singer-songwriter tradition. Aili Järvelä has been involved in music all her life and studies music now in Helsinki, also teaching the violin at the same time. Jussi Petäjä is a music teacher and musician, whose projects include Prusikoukku, Ville Kangas and Puuma, Captain Cougar ja Blackbird.

Aura Pineda - Kunpa vois

Aura was born in Helsinki 19 years ago. She started studying music at the age of seven and has pursued that until today. She says she wants to reach the inner feelings of her audience with her velvety voice. The song Kunpa vois is said to combine traditional Finnish tango melody with modern pop. Aura is looking forward to continuing her music studies at the Berklee College of Music in Boston.

Freeman & Uusi Fantasia - Noitanainen

Freeman & Uusi Fantasia: Leo Friman, Street Kobra, Ercola, Kroko-Roc & Mariska. A Finnish rock legend, Freeman will be 60 years old in September. He started collaborating with electro rockers Uusi Fantasia from Helsinki last year and even released an album together. Freeman writes most of the songs together with the band and he is famous for his catchy melodies. Freeman has had a long career in Finnish pop since the 70’s and one of his bands is called Menneisyyden vangit, where he shares the lead vocals with Vicky Rosti, the Finnish Eurovision Song Contest entrant from 1987.

Iconcrash - We are the night

Iconcrash: Jaani Peuhu, Matti Toivonen, Oskari Vilmunen, Riku Mattila, Arttu Juntunen. Iconcrash describe themselves as an electrorock/darkwave band, that has been active since 2005. They have so far recorded three albums and their music has ended up on movie soundtracks. Their latest single Stockholm has been received well by radio stations and critics. The band made a big tour of Finland, Russia and Belarus and looking to tour Europe in 2012.

Jari & Taika  - Aamuyön salaisuus

Jari & Taika: Jari Mustajärvi, Jukka Kaurila, Jaakko Heikkilä, Hannu Karvia, Kimmo Rikkonen. The band was formed in 2004 and describe their music as dance music, probably in its earlier meaning of dance band schlager. The band leader, Jari Mustajärvi started performing at the age of five. He studied music and performed together with Jukka Kaurila then, and got together with him in this band in 2009. Jukka, being an avid fan of the Beatles has brought some elements for the band to Jari & Taika’s repertoire.

Kaisa Vala - Habits of human beings

Kaisa is a singer-songwriter from the Eastern town of Joensuu. Kaisa accompanies herself with a piano and thinks it is most important to be brave and break established patterns in making music. She has recorded two albums so far, the first being inspired by the fringe between life and death, entitled Ghost Waltz.

Kirahvi nimeltä Tuike - Sinisulkien viimeinen

Kirahvi nimeltä Tuike: Visa Kurki, Mikko Tirri, Niklas Nybom, Eero Laaksonen. This extrovertly named band (A giraffe called Glimmer) started when Mikko met Tuike, a giraffe from the would of fairytales and wanted to tell the world about it. The band has achieved some success in Southwestern Finland, and released their critically acclaimed first album in 2010. They describe their music as happy, synth driven nonsensical prog rock.

Leola - Rytmit rikkoutuu

Leola: Tuuli Okkonen, Hannu Huhtamo, Kuisma Eskola, Veikko Ruuskanen. Leola hails from Helsinki and combines rough basement band sounds with cool electronica. The band started off making indie pop in English, but started experimenting in singing in Finnish last year while keeping their style. The lead singer Tuuli says she sings about everyday life in the northern capital: growing up, love, wearing lifestyles and finding your own way. The name of the band is Italian and translates as Lioness.

Mica Iconen  - Antaa mennä

Mica Iconen first became famous in the 1990’s as the lead singer of the first boy band ever in Finland, XL5. The band sold loads of records and made girls wild on their live gigs. At the start of the new Millennium Mica started his new band Käsityöläiset, who can also count former Finnish Eurovision entrant Vicky Rosti amongst their guest singers. When he met musician and producer Lauri Hämäläinen a new collaboration started and the UMK entry Antaa menna is a result of this.

Pernilla Karlsson - När jag blundar

Pernilla has the only song sung in the other official language of Finland, Swedish. She says she has enjoyed performing from a little girl, whether it be singing or dressing up as St. Lucy at the Scandinavian December tradition. In 2006, when she was 15 years old, she took part in a Swedo-Finnish song festival and won. Her sports activities however won over music then, until her brother became a sound technician and opened his own recording studio in Helsinki. The familiar surroundings encouraged Pernilla to start taking her singing seriously again.

Stig - Laululeija

Stig got the idea of R’n’b stardom while pushing a cleaning trolley. He was working as a cleaner on the Helsink Metro when he decided to have a new direction and wrote his first songs in a broom cupboard. He took his artist name from his idol Nate Dogg and became Stig Dogg a.k.a. R. Kelly of Punavuori (a district in Central Helsinki). He made a demo in his bedroom, and it spread through the underground to wider audiences. This resulted in two self-released albums full of parodies of r’n’b and hip-hop clichés. He has also studied film sound for some time now. As just Stig he is now starting a new acoustic and organic phase in his career. The lyrics in Laululeija are by Paula Vesala, one half of mega popular girl pop duo PMMP.

Ville Eetvartti – Lasikaupunki

Ville Eetvartti Parkkonen hails from Eastern Finland countryside. He has already gained some experience as a singer, songwriter and producer. He has also trained as a fire fighter. He first became know as the solist of the band Killville, and returned to the public eye with the popular TV contest Clash of the Choirs. Ville eventually changed the language of his music to Finnish. His solo album is scheduled for release in 2012. For the Finnish audiences Ville’s brother Pete Parkkonen is also known via Idols, where he was third in the fourth season of the talent show.

These 12 have been produced into radio versions and will also be released on the first UMK compilation CD, out next week. The 12 new mixes will also played on YLE Radio Suomi on Sunday, 29 January 15:05 CET (16:05 local time). YLE radio stations are streamed here, and available worldwide