Over the years, Oskar Merikanto has evolved into an essential voice of Finnish musical culture. His frequently performed songs are often mistaken for folk songs because of their characteristically Finnish melodic quality. The freshness and timelessness of Merikanto’s melodic and harmonic languages easily fitted with the rhythmic elements of jazz. The tonal and thematic structure of “Summer Evening’s Waltz” matches its contemporary ragtime pieces, and the opening track “Idyll” (1910) features harmonies similar to what eg. Bill Evans was using in his compositions. Both pieces were changed from waltz ¾-time to 4/4 in order to increase their jazz-expression. The program on this CD got its start in the summer of 2013 when the Matheson-Mikkola Duo was performing at the “Summer Evening’s Jazz” festival in Vilppula, located in central Finland. For over twenty years, Merikanto brought his family to spend their summers at their nearby summer-cottage called “Kantola”. It was in this peaceful environment that Merikanto could delve into his compositional work on the upright piano that was transported there every summer, first from Helsinki by train and then by horse-carriage from the Vilppula train station. Because of his active performing schedule and his duties as organist at St. John’s Cathedral in Helsinki, most of his compositions were written during his vacations at “Kantola”. The name of the Vilppula jazz festival serves as a tribute to Merikanto since one of his most popular (and earliest) compositions is known as “Summer Evening’s Waltz” (orig. “Grande Valse” – 1885). The organizers of the Vilppula jazz festival were so enthusiastic about the material the duo performed on their 2013 CD-release tour (for their first CD “Duetti”) that they asked us to create a program of jazz arrangements of Merikanto’s compositions for the tenth anniversary of the festival in the summer of 2014. This commission was eagerly accepted by both musicians, who have considerable experience in transforming different types of music using the stylistic elements of jazz. – Wade Mikkola Arranging the music of Oskar Merikanto for our jazz duo was a fun, educational and challenging project. The two selections I arranged contained a wealth of melodic and harmonic content. "Summer Evening’s Waltz" has a wonderfully strong and varied melodic line which adapted itself well to a jazz-based setting. The harmony and melody of "Improvisation" in its original form is strongly suggestive of modal jazz from the late 1950s and all that was required to bring it into the realm of our jazz duo were a few rhythmic and harmonic adjustments that I hope the composer would have approved of. – Alan Matheson