TõNu Kaljuste
Biography
Tõnu Kaljuste (born August 28, 1953) is an Estonian conductor. Born in Tallinn, Kaljuste is the son of Heino Kaljuste (1925–1989), an Estonian choral conductor, and Lia Kaljuste, a radio journalist. Tõnu sang in his father's choirs as a child and graduated from the Tallinn Music High School (Tallinna Muusikakeskkool) in 1971. He completed a graduate degree at the Tallinn Conservatory in 1976, studying with Jüri Variste and Roman Matsov, and continued as a postgraduate at the Leningrad Conservatory until 1978. Kaljuste took his father's role as leader of the Ellerhein Chamber choir in 1974, an ensemble that performed choral works ranging from Renaissance music to contemporary avant-garde music. He was professor of choral conducting at the Tallinn Conservatory from 1978 to 1980 and won the Best Conductor prize at the 1980 Béla Bartók International Choral Competition. With financial support from the Estonian government, Kaljuste turned the Ellerhein Chamber Choir into a full-time ensemble and renamed it the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir in 1981. Kaljuste also conducted with the Estonian National Opera between 1978 and 1995. In October 1980, Kaljuste was a signatory of the Letter of 40 Intellectuals, a public letter in which forty prominent Estonian intellectuals defended the Estonian language and protested the Russification policies of the Kremlin in Estonia. The signatories also expressed their unease against Republic-level government in harshly dealing with youth protests in Tallinn that were sparked a week earlier due to the banning of a public performance of the punk rock band Propeller. After Estonia regained independence in 1991, many of the barriers to international performing and recording were lifted, and Kaljuste became well known for his recordings on ECM Records of the works of Estonian composers such as Veljo Tormis, Erkki-Sven Tüür, Heino Eller, and Arvo Pärt. In 1993, he formed the Tallinn Chamber Orchestra; he was also principal conductor of the
Bio from Wikipedia
Discography
Records they worked on — most-collected first.
Credited work
214 releases · 40 albums · active 1976–2025
- Performance · 257
- Mastering · 26
- Engineering · 11
- Other credits · 10
- Production · 1
Studios: Niguliste Church, Tallinn · Estonia Concert Hall, Tallinn · Methodist Church, Tallinn · Lohjan Pyhän Laurin Kirkko