Teachers

Nowadays a citizen of Finland and the US, Paula Anttila (former Jaakkola) is a singer-songwriter who moved to New York in 1999 to study jazz vocals at the New School University. She lived and worked in the city for 16 years after which she spent one year in Tuscany, Italy. Paula, born and raised in Helsinki, studied singing and piano in Pop/Jazz Conservatory and did her Master’s degree in Ethnomusicology at the University of Helsinki.

During the New York City years she led many music projects and got excited about songwriting as well. At first she performed in groups that she initially formed, like “Kaamos” pop band and “Paula Jaakkola Jazz Quartet”. During the years 2003-2010 Paula wrote and arranged songs to a Finnish world music ensemble “Kaiku”. She performed and toured with the band in the US, Canada and Finland. Kaiku published two albums. During 2009-2012 Paula co-led SkanDivas cabaret act with two other singers. The trio’s theatrical shows were always sold-out in the well-known cabaret club in the West Village of New York.

In 2012 Paula concentrated on her singer-songwriter career. She started working together with a music producer-musician Ape Anttila and published her first solo album “Holy” in 2013. The self-released album was played on local radio stations in the US and in some stations in Finland. In addition to gigging Paula performed and taught five years with a kids’ rock band “Songs For Seeds” and taught private voice and piano lessons.

In the spring of 2016 Paula settled back to Finland with her husband Ape Anttila. The concept idea to the Funky Monkey Club music program was born in 2017 when she was on maternity leave. During that time Paula & Ape started co-writing children’s pop/rock music. The test groups for Funky Monkey Club started in Jätkäsaari, Helsinki and Lohja in September 2017. Paula Anttila is one of the founders and the CEO of Funky Monkey Club. She takes care of the music instruction, the curriculum and the every-day affairs.

In addition to running the business Paula likes to swim, jog and read, and takes care of her 2-year-old son.

Ari-Pekka, a.k.a. “Ape” Anttila is a bassist and one of the top professional musicians in Finland. In addition to being a musician/bassist, his career has been filled with composing, arranging, producing and teaching.

Ape completed his degree of MFA at Sibelius Academy in 2000. From the year 2004 on he has been the head teacher at the Sibelius Academy youth jazz department. Since 1989 he has performed with the top jazz musicians of Finland and has toured in most of the European countries as well as in the USA, Mexico and Singapore. One of the note-worthy ensembles has been the UMO Jazz Orchestra with which Ape did a massive European tour in 1994 featuring Natalie Cole.

In the year 2001 Ape joined Lenni-Kalle Taipale Trio and had a chance to perform with well-known Finnish artists like Mike Monroe, Irina and Anssi Kela. Ape was also a musician and an arranger of the Joonas Hytönen TV show house band.

In 2007-2014 Ape was a Principal to a music school in Lohja. He has been the Artistic Director of the Sibelius Academy Jazz Camp for about 10 years. For several times Ape has been a Conductor for TV house bands at beauty pageants “Miss Suomi” and “Miss Baltic Sea”.

Ape Anttila has worked in numerous music productions as a producer, composer-arranger, and a musician to various record labels like Naxos/Prophone (Ira Kaspi: You And The Night And The Music”- producer/arranger), Texicalli Records (Vilma Timonen Quartet ”VTQ”, producer-arranger-musician), Universal Music (Kirsi Ranto ”Kotimatka” CD, producer-arranger-musician), Warner Music Finland (Lenni-Kalle Taipale Trio ”Lumia”CD, producer-arranger-musician), Lahden Levy-yhtiö Oy (Jarkko Martikainen ”Rakkaus”CD, musician), Music With Wings LLC (Paula Jaakkola: “Holy”, producer-arranger-musician) and Ääniä Records (Vilma Timonen Quartet ”Forward” CD, producer-arranger-musician, The album won an Emma Award in 2009).

Ape Anttila is one of the founders of Funky Monkey Club and the Chairman of the Board. He is also the co-instructor at music classes and the accompanying guitarist. He has co-written children songs with Paula to the music program and is in charge of the recordings and the music production of these songs.