Delicato is a male quartet from Raisio, a town close to Turku, the historical capital of Finland. The quartet was founded in 1982 to promote high-quality performance of male quartet music. Our aim is to uphold this eloquent ideal by performing mainly in the area around of Turku, the cultural center of Finland.

The singers in the quartet are Jukka Sallinen (I tenor), Robert Paul (II tenor), Lauri Kangas (I base) and Kalevi Vä-Eskeli (II base). Mr. Kangas is the artistic director and Mr. Vä-Eskeli is the chairman of the quartet. Mr. Kangas has made most of the arrangements of the songs on the repertoire of the quartet since the middle of the 1990's. Since 2009 the voice of the first tenor has been sung by Jukka Sallinen, who replaced Veikko Ilola, one of the founders of the quartet who wanted to step down from the first tenor voice. Mr. Ilola continues within the administration of the Delicato association.

We present preferentially classical and sacral music, but occasionally we want to enlighten the day of many a temporal wanderer by singing folk songs, serenades and the likes. Indeed, this more popular side of Delicato has materialized into a record published in 1998 labeled Be loved, my Beloved.

The quartet's second record The church yesterday and today contains a selection of Finnish sacral music since medieval times up to today.  The two first records are regrettably no longer available.
The third record containing a selection of songs sung in the Finnish primary schools in the years around 1920 - 1950 was published in 2003 - Alakansakoulun lauluja. The record was supported by a grant from the Finnish Cultural Foundation (Suomen Kulttuurirahasto).  It is still available (TILAUSLOMAKE).

Our fourth CD was published in the end on 2008.  Having completed the school song album, the quartet felt that it was time give some new input to the art of male quartet music in Finland.  The CD Paljain jaloin (Barefooted) is the result of this desire.  The entire repertoire is new, expressly composed for Delicato and for this CD.  Delicate hopes that the new CD will provide in injection to rekindle the interest of the public in this genre.   In fact, there has been an upsurge of recordings of the old primary school songs after our album of primary school songs.  Maybe the same will result after Paljain jaloin.

In addition to this record we keep ourselves visible and audible by performing on a record published by the local regional county organizations and the Finnish Broadcasting Company. In 1997 we performed in Barcelona, Spain and in 1995 – 1998 we made a tour to many towns in Southern Finland with our sacral music repertoire.  In  2003 Delicato made a tour to Madrid and Salamanca, Spain. 

< Back