BRILLIANT CELLO PLAYING (title of the review)
One often hears the Tchaikovsky's Rococo variations just like a "bravura" number where the soloist transforms the piece into un uninhibited technical display. Instead of that, Pia Segerstam knows what rococo means. Her brilliant technique was totally in the service of the artistic view. The piece was performed with rare grace and facility. Pia Segerstam has a beautiful round sound and also a crystal clear articulation which made it possible to distinguish each note of all the rapid running passages and figurations. Her cadenza playing was totally sovereign.
Reidar Sunnerstam, Norrköpings tidningar 5.2.1996 (Sweden)

Pia Segerstam performed the Tchaikovsky's Rococo variations with great musical integrity. With well chosen simplicity and unpretentious playing the soloist seemed to rest in the musical happening…Here [When playing "At the border" composed by Leif Segerstam] Pia Segerstam played with shivering intensity, with glissandi like whispers, charging the piece with a high dynamical tension.
Siv Jogfors, Folkbladet 5.2.1996 (Sweden)

Her performance was absolutely brilliant...noble elegance with a warm portative sound, where articulation and phrasing became pieces of delicacy...a wonderful richness of character and dynamics in the different variations of the piece...One would like to hear the great playing of this cellist again.
Staffan Sjölund, Västerbottens folkblad 7.4.1995 (Sweden)

Elegant, well formed and well sounding within particularly clear frames and with a strong romantic engagement...strong overall concept.
Leif Larsson, Vesterbottens kuriren 8.4.1995 (Sweden)

She played the cello part in the double concerto remarkably actively and vigorously with an astonishingly mature and beautiful sound...without doubt one of our big cello talents.
Folke Forsman, Huvudstadsbladet 29.3.1992 (Finland)

The young cellist Pia Segerstam showed astonishing assurance and strength in her demanding part.
Olli Varonen, Keskisuomalainen 14.1.1995 (Finland)

With his Cello Concerto "Tout un monde lointain..." (1960-1970), Henri Dutilleux has created Introvert music with seismographic sensitivity, a highly complex score rooted in silence and reflection; based on five poems of Baudelaire. For the last movement, "Hymne", Dutilleux gives the words: "Garde tes songes: 'Les sages n'en ont pas d'aussi beaux que les fous!"
One couldn't but admire Pia Segerstam's intellectual sovereignty the nobility and the polished virtuosity of her playing on the precious instrument, her emotional explicity with a concentrated outside appearance and the flawless collaboration with the orchestra, whose members expressed the chamber-musical character of the work in various constellations.
Der Bund (Switzerland), 20.11.1999

The cello concerto by Edward Elgar is a work containing swinging sentimento, large curves and fervent virtuoso, which is what most cellists grasp frantically.
Pia Segerstam has been thinking a lot, also about this concerto. So now she performed a lingering, very sorrowful and very intimate vision of Elgar's almost worn-out concerto.
Pia Segerstam is like an actor of the No-theatre, described by the classic Motokiyo as a performer whose spirit always works with more power than the body. The performance and the soloist as a whole brought almost inevitably in mind the madonna-figure of Michelangelo's early statue Pietà, the most romantic one, with all it's nuances.
Too see the Elgar Concerto more like a presentiment, rather than as a proclamation is in it self already a very original and attractive solution.
Lauri Otonkoski, Helsingin Sanomat 24.4.1999

Glowing tone and perfectly tuned chord playing…wonderful intensity and musical brilliance.
Reidar Sunnerstam, Norrköpings tidningar 17.12.92 (Sweden)

Thürmer Hall: Unusual Concert dedicated to Nikos Skalkottas (50 years of his death)
The playing of Pia Segerstam, who has recorded these pieces on CD, held the listeners all the time spellbound. Particularly Small Serenade and Bolero sounded with large musical density and intensity.
Westdeutche Allgemeine Zeitung (Germany) 10.12. 1999

Excellent interpreter of new music
Kirsti Vanninen, Aamulehti 9.3.1993 (Finland)

The Segerstam-Sirodeau Duo is a very high level combination, that I would be pleased to hear again.
Olli Varonen Keskisuomalainen 6.7.97 (Finland)

Pia Segerstam's playing was all together (in Schumann, Liszt, Reger as well as Chopin) very intensive and exceptionally musical: the phrases showed total maturity, the Adagios and Largos were singing beautifully, though there was no lack of fire either.
Eija Korhonen 5.7.97 Kainuun Sanomat (Finland)

A real soloistic dialogue throughout the concert...
When an artist has achieved as high a technical level as Pia Segerstam or Christophe Sirodeau, he or she can concentrate on the essential, the music itself
The attention of the listener was attracted right from the beginning. The critic forgot all his analytic intentions as he was submerged by the flow of clearly distinguished notes, huge dynamics, sharp and exact triplets, alternating Teutonic scherzos, prestos and lyrical, passionate slow movements.
Urpo Huovinen Kaleva 4.7.97 (Finland)

The best performance was that of Pia Segerstam. She played Tchaikovsky's Pezzo Capriccioso with excellent precision and musicality.
Hannu-Ilari Lampila, Helsingin Sanomat 2/1988 (Finland)

Segerstam: Chamber Works BIS 792:
...The concert performances, with the composer's daughter on cello, are strong and involving, and the sound is vivid. This disc is a gratifying addition to the recent, brilliant shower of Northern lights in contemporary music.
Sullivan - American Record Guide May/June 1997 (USA)

Ondine ODE 877-2 Segerstam: Orchestral works
...Epitaph benefits from the two soloists (the conductors wife and daughter, excellent both)...
Fanfare November/December 1996 (USA)