(headline image: Antti Paalanen – Photo by Kimmo Kansala)
Antti Paalanen, born in 1977 and raised in Southern Ostrobothnia’s pelimanni heartland, builds a roaring engine out of reeds and air, and then drives it hard.
He learned from old master players as a teenager, then proved the point in competitions: four Finnish pelimanni accordion championships between 1987 and 1996, followed by second place at the 1999 world diatonic accordion championship in Austria. His studies at the Sibelius Academy sharpened his technique, culminating in a master’s degree in 2006 and a doctorate in 2015.
His project is radical onstage. Paalanen weaves traditional Finnish dance melodies into the pulse of contemporary club culture. The accordion, long a village dance machine, meets electronic propulsion and Siberian-inspired throat singing, with a streak of adolescent metal fandom flickering through the arrangements. The mix can feel like a midsummer bonfire thrown onto a frozen lake: heat, glare, and a shock of contrast.
In Paalanens hands, the bisonoric diatonic accordion changes pitch with every push and pull, and Paalanen exploits that physiology with a concept he calls “bellows rhythmics.” A custom keyboard layout and rigorously drilled patterns let him supply bass, harmony, melody, percussion, and voice at once. He is a one-man ensemble whose moving parts lock like gears. The instrument’s aerophone mechanics inspired his nickname for it, the “breathbox,” because he treats air not just as fuel but as phrasing, contour, and attack. Sound designer Samuli Volanto extends that idea with a discreet electronic frame.
The album Äärelä (2007) introduced the breathbox spirit. Breathbox (2010) pushed volume and velocity. Meluta (2014) crystallized his bellows-driven grammar and later supported his doctoral work. Bursting Bellows – Bisonoric Accordion’s Bellows Rhythmics in Composition; Rujo (2019) deepened the grit.
Meluta drew nominations for the 2016 Nordic Council Music Prize and the 2015 Teosto Prize, while Breathbox (2011) and Rujo (2020) earned Etno Album of the Year at Finland’s Emma Gala. He received the Finnish Music Publishers Association’s Composer of Finnish Contemporary Folk Music award in 2019 and the Nordic songwriters organizations’ NPU prize in 2022.
Tours carried Paalanen across Europe and into the United States, China, Canada, Russia, and Japan. Fifteen guest appearances on other artists’ albums show a craftsman comfortable as collaborator, and his stage work for the Finnish National Theatre and other major houses proves that his sense of drama translates off the festival circuit.
Paalanen’s live experience is striking. Stomps, growls, and bellows-tears create a ritual charge. At peak intensity, the room vibrates like a foundry; at softer moments, the reeds whisper as if the instrument itself were catching its breath.
With his accordion, Paalanen wants to speak today’s dance language, and he has built a method to make that argument convincing.
Discography
Solo albums & Singles & EP’s
Äärelä, album (Seita Music, 2007)
Breathbox, album (Siba Records, 2010)
Meluta, album (Rockadillo Records, 2014)
Child in you, single (Rockadillo Records, 2017)
Rujo, album (Rockadillo Records, 2019)
Wakamambo, single (Rockadillo Records, 2019)
Elä, single (Rockadillo Records, 2019)
Häijy Olo, EP (Rockadillo Records, 2020)
Suvi, single (Rockadillo Records, 2021)
Alavilla mailla, single (Rockadillo Records, 2024)
Laulu luonnolle, single on compilation Nouse Luonto – Songs of Nordic Biodiversity (2025)
Author: Madison Quinn
