Timo-Veikko ‘Tipi’ Valve, now celebrating his 20th anniversary with the Australian Chamber Orchestra, says joining the Orchestra was “like jumping into a moving car”.
Written by Anna Snoekstra
Two decades ago, Timo-Veikko ‘Tipi’ Valve made a decision that would change the course of his life. The Helsinki-born cellist had just graduated from the Edsberg Music Institute in Stockholm and had also come out of a long-term relationship, when an invitation arrived to audition for the Australian Chamber Orchestra.
“It was quite a positive thing in a challenging moment for me personally,” he reminisces. “Two massive things were coming to an end and there I was, 24 years young, thinking, what am I going to do now?”
Valve enjoyed his student years. He loved immersing himself in learning and absorbing everything that the community around him had to offer, instilling a deep sense of curiosity and a collaborative spirit that remains to this day. After wrapping up his studies, he imagined he would freelance for a while. He had never considered joining a group, nothing bigger than a string quartet anyway.
“I was mainly focused on doing my own thing, being the modern-day musician, nurturing a diverse palette of roles, and seeing where that might lead me,” he says.
He thought the audition would provide good experience. “I literally thought that okay, if I’m going to do this audition and fail, no one in Finland is going to know because it’s in Australia,” he laughs. “So, I have nothing to lose. Perhaps I’ll go for a visit, experience Australia and learn a few things, and then I’ll move on with whatever my professional life will be. But here we are, 20 years later.”
Valve is Principal Cello at the ACO, having had a remarkable tenure curating, commissioning and premiering new works and reviving beloved classics with the Orchestra. He has toured extensively with the ACO, balancing his career with the Orchestra alongside his work as a soloist and chamber musician, both here in Australia and abroad, but calls Sydney home.
It was difficult to move to a country where he knew no one, but he found belonging with his new colleagues. “The band became my family,” he says, describing the experience of joining the group at that time as being “like jumping into a moving car”. “My personality as a musician was a match with what the ACO was then and still is today. It was a very short honeymoon period, if you like, before it all became a big part of my life”.
For almost 10 years Valve has played a Brothers Amati cello from 1616, which he calls “a good friend”. He believes that his instrument has become part of his personality, and it’s a connection he devotes himself to. “It can take years to really master and be comfortable with this wooden object,” he says.
“It’s still very much a living thing. It reacts to a cold rainy Sydney day like today, the same way we people might.”
His relationship with his instrument is not the only deep connection he’s formed within the ACO: Valve is violinist Liisa Pallandi’s partner. They enjoy all the travel together that working as an ACO musician entails, and making the most out of the time spent away from their home. Valve says, “Both the ups and downs of a touring lifestyle, or just life in general – I’m lucky I get to share all that with Liisa.”
Valve is exactly where he wants to be; surrounded by a community where collaboration is a key principle. He cherishes the quieter moments, when he and fellow ACO musicians can work together without the pressure of a deadline, entering the same headspace effortlessly. “The way that we work together as a section, or between the principal players, is almost telepathic, after so much shared time and knowledge together,” he explains.
For Valve, what the musicians do collectively is more important than what he does alone. “We’re talking about my 20 years, but it’s our 20 years,” he says. “I’m the newest member of the cello and bass section, which means that we have now played together for two decades. Melissa, Julian, Max, and I have really stuck together. Thinking about that now fills me with deep gratitude. So, when we talk about my anniversary, that’s my association: it’s our anniversary.”
Anna Snoekstra is the author of six novels that have been translated across the globe. The Ones We Love is out now and her next novel, The End of the Ski Season, will be released in January 2027 by Penguin Books Australia. She also writes for The Saturday Paper.
