Sonja Fräki (b. 1977 Helsinki) is an active performing pianist, known both as a soloist and as an experienced chamber musician. Her repertoire covers a wide range of the basic classical repertoire and she is also an enthusiastic interpreter of new music. Her speciality is the piano works of Kalevi Aho, which she has performed in their entirety. Aho’s output was also the subject of Fräki’s artistic doctorate. She graduated with a doctorate in music from the Sibelius Academy at the University of the Arts Helsinki in the autumn of 2016.

Fräki has been successful in numerous international piano competitions. In 2008 she won third prize at the Franz Liszt Competition in Wroclaw, Poland. In 2003 she was awarded fourth prize at the Franz Schubert Piano Competition in Dortmund, where she also received a special prize for the best performance of Schubert’s late sonata. She has also won prizes at the Maj Lind International Piano Competition in Helsinki 2007 and the Paderewski Competition in Poland in 1998. She has participated in international Chopin competitions in Warsaw and Darmstadt.

Sonja Fräki has appeared as a soloist with numerous orchestras, including the Tapiola Sinfonietta, Turku Philharmonic Orchestra, Sinfonia Lahti, Neue Philharmonie Westfalen and Pomeranian Philharmonic Orchestra. Fräki has also released two solo albums, the latter featuring a solo piano production by Kalevi Aho on the BIS label. Fräki has also recorded Aho’s chamber music for BIS and her first piano concerto as piano soloist of the Turku Philharmonic Orchestra.

Fräki works as a lecturer of accompaniment and piano at the Juvenalia Music School in Espoo and as a chamber pianist at the Sibelius Academy.