Imbi Tarum

b. April 3, 1956 Tartu
Member of the Association of Estonian Professional Musicians

Harpsichord player Imbi Tarum is highly valued interpreter of early music in Estonia. She regularly performs as a soloist, participates in different early music projects and ensembles. She is also a well-known pedagogue and an active figure in Estonian musical life.

In 1975, Imbi Tarum graduated as a pianist from Heino Eller Tartu Music School and in 1980, from Tallinn State Conservatory with Bruno Lukk (Cum Laude). She has improved her skills with Ton Koopman and Vaughan Schlepp and with Bob van Asperen and Menno van Delft at Amsterdam Conservatory (2008). She has participated in master courses of Richard Egarr, Jacques Ogg et al and in the international early music seminar Capita Selecta in Amsterdam (1998–2000). In 2012, she defended her doctoral theses On the treatment of harpsichord in works by present-day Estonian composers.

Imbi Tarum can be considered a pioneer of harpsichord teaching in Estonia. Since 1991, she has been teaching harpsichord and basso continuo at the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre (since 1996 associate professor, since 2013 professor). Her best known students are Ene Nael, Kristiina Are, Marju Vatsel, Oksana Butsenko-Delaforge, Iren Lill, Reinut Tepp, Ele Sonn and Saale Metsar. In 1992–2002, she annually organized harpsichord summer courses in Raudaskylä, Finland, she has also led harpsichord courses in different music universities in Europe (Rome, Salerno, Verona, Pesaro, Hague, Madrid, Poznań, Trossingen, Weimar, Salzburg, Halle, Berlin, Jeruslaem, Stockholm, Zaragoza) and taught at international Nordplus summer courses in Ventspils, Latvia (2008). Since 2000, Imbi Tarum is also the teacher of annual summer courses in Estonia.

Imbi Tarum is an active musician, who performs solo recitals, chamber music and as continuo player in Estonia and abroad. During 1978–1992, Imbi Tarum was the harpsichordist of early music ensemble Hortus Musicus (artistic director Andres Mustonen), performing in several European countries and metropolises of the former Soviet Union (e.g. Moscow, Leningrad and Kyiv), as well as in the U.S. and Israel. She regularly performs with ensembles Tallinn Baroque and Corelli Consort and Tallinn Baroque Orchestra. She has also collaborated with foreign ensembles and orchestras like Concerto Copenhagen (Denmark), Concerto Palatino (Netherlands), His Majesty’s Sagbutts and Cornetts (UK), Sansara (Latvia) etc. Among her ensemble partners in Estonia have been singers Kaia Urb, Risto Joost, Uku Joller and Kädy Plaas and baroque cellists Tõnu Jõesaar ja Villu Vihermäe. The list of foreign vocal and instrumental soloists includes basses Harry van der Kamp (Netherlands) and Peter Kooij (Netherlands), sopranos Gloria Bandiatelli (Italy), Ellen Hargis (USA) and Agnés Alibert (France), counter tenor Mikael Bellini (Sweden), cellist Hans-Rolf Hauck (Germany), recorder players Ingrid Paul (Germany) and Bolette Roed (Denmark), harpsichordist Edward Parmentier (USA), Ives Cuenot (France) and Anssi Mattila (Finland), violinists Xiang Gao (USA), Ann Walström (Sweden), Lucy van Dael (Netherlands), Alberto Martini (Italy) and Aurelius Golinski (Denmark), flute players Stéfane Reti (France), Jaume Cortadellas (Spain) and Jari Puhakka (Finland), viola da gamba player Bruno Re (Italy), oboe players Rafael Palacios (Mexico) and Andrea Mion (Italy). Imbi has also cooperated closely with baroque musicians and festivals in Latvia and Lithuania.

Since 2010, Imbi participates in the recording of Antonio Vivaldi’s violin sonatas with ensemble Baltic Baroque. The ensemble has released 10 CDs which have received very positive international feedback from music critics. Since 2013, Imbi Tarum began playing together with harpsichordist Julia Ageyeva Hess as a harpsichord duo, they have performed at festivals in U.S. Italy, Finland and Estonia.
In her repertoire, Imbi Tarum gives preference to German, Italian, French, Spanish and English keyboard and ensemble music from the 16th to 18th century. She has made recordings for the Estonian Radio. In 2007, Imbi Tarum’s solo-CD „Vertigo” with harpsichord music by Joseph Nicolas Pancrace Royer, Jean-Philippe Rameau, Jean-Baptiste Antoine Forqueray and Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre was released by Estonian Record Production (ERP).

Imbi Tarum has been the artistic director of all Harpsichord Days festival in Estonia. She has also acted as a music consultant of the Church Music Festival in Rapla. Since 2001, Tarum has been the head of the Estonian Harpsichord Friends’ Society. She has also written articles on music for various newspapers and magazines.

Imbi Tarum has received the Cultural Endowment of Estonia "Live and Shine" grant (2015), the Association of the Estonian Professional Musicians’ grant (2007) and the annual prize of the Cultural Endowment of Estonia (2016).

Imbi Tarum is represented by Estonian Record Productions.

© EMIC 2009
(updated November 2016)

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