Per-Ake Holmlander is born in 1957 in Skellefteå in the very north of Sweden. Holmlander received his diploma in classical tuba in 1983 at the Royal Academy of Music in Stockholm with Michael Lind as a teacher. Holmlander has always worked simultaneously with improvisation, jazz and rock music as well as classical and contemporary music.
As an improviser Holmlander has worked with - Eje Thelin, Marilyn Crispell, Paul Lovens, Folke Rabe, Phil Minton, Sten Sandell, Sven-Åke Johansson, Mats Persson, Gunter Christmann, Kjell Westling, Keith Rowe, Jan Allan, Georg Riedel, Position Alpha, DJustable, Jon Vanderlander Trio, The Swedish Radio Jazz Group, Ken Vandermark – Territory Band & Resonance Ensemble, The Frontroom Ensemble, London Jazz Composers Orchestra, Torden Kvartetten & Peter Brötzmann Chicago Tentet…among many others.
Holmlander works a lot with theatre music, sometimes he plays solo and he regularly works with Fire! Orchestra, Paal Nilssen-Love Large Unit, Barry Guy New Orchestra, Fredrik Ljungkvist and his Yun Kan 5 & 10 and recently with Parti&Minut, Swedish azz, Inner Ear, Mats Gustafsson & NU-Ensemble.

Per-Åke has participated in more than 100 records and 1800 theatrical performances. He has given concerts in 35 countries and he is since December 2008 a member of the government run – Musikalliansen