Risto Juhani Tuominen (born January 14, 1976) is a Finnish record producer, songwriter, guitarist, vocalist and musician. He is currently the guitarist of the hard rock band Wake The Nations.

He took piano lessons while growing up with a teacher called Hannu Takala. With his guidance, Risto started to get more in to music. Also Risto's big brother Lars got him in to playing guitar. He started playing gigs when he was in age of 13 with his friends Veikko Wahlroos, Janne Granfors, Mika Isotalo and Janne Isotalo. They formed their first band in 4 Naked Indians in 1990 and started to write songs and doing lot's of demo tapes. They were really serious with their music and aimed high but when Veikko and Janne had to go to army, rest of the boys started doing more work with the other projects. From 1996 to 2009 Risto played in different local bands ( Unikuva, Habanero, Chris Paton Band, Status Quo Tribute band, 6th Hour Jam band etc.) playing various style of music, from Metal to traditional Finnish schlagers.

In 2009, Risto got interested in a band that was being established by Janne ‘Gekko’ Granfors: a grunge-type of band with Krister Stenbom on the lead vocals, Tuomas Pelli on drums, and Gekko on guitar. They were after a bass player, but since Risto came along, Gekko took the bass guitar. A hard rock band ‘Villa Sucka’ was formed. They wrote songs actively and recorded an EP during the spring of 2010.

In the same year, Risto got recruited to a melodic rock/AOR band ‘Human Temple’. 2010 band started to work on their third album "Halfway to Heartache" (Released in 2012, Escape Music). Band's vocalist Janne Hurme was the main songwriter in that album but Risto co-wrote one song and did some arrangements to some songs. They toured quite a lot between 2010-2012. Highlights were being opening acts for Apocalyptica.

As Human Temple was having a break, Risto decided to start recording his solo album in 2012. During the past years, he had written some songs that were never published. Risto asked Jorge, Gekko and Kalle Saarinen, all from Human Temple, to help him with the record. Also, Tuomas got an enquiry whether he could join. Initially the idea was to record already written songs just for his own sake, with good quality. But things got more and more ambitious…

Risto came up with a thought of ‘Wake the Nations’ project band. Janne Hurme (Human Temple) and Petri Kitti (Violent Code) permitted him to record two of their songs as well, and so the album became to form an entity of its own.It took a year to fine-tune the songs. When it was time to record the vocals, Risto wasn’t confident enough to do it himself. So, he began to search for proper singers. In 2013, he found Estef Martinez (Insider) from Ecuador, Dado Topić (Time) from Croatia, Taage Laiho (Kilpi), and Nils Nordling (Silver Bullet). Janne Hurme and Krister Stenbom were invited also. In addition, Timo Pelander (Finlanders) played guitars and Jari Pailamo (King Company) keys on some tracks.

‘Sign of Heart’ was born in January 2015. The album got its way to the top-50 of the official Finnish chart in the first week after release.The band did not have a fixed front man and they were not supposed to tour anyways. But as a one-time-occasion, they played at album release party, it became evident that WTN would continue playing for live audience. Soon Krister joined the band and WTN hit bigger stages. Live performance in DBTL festival 2015 was a turning point: WTN opened for Sunrise Avenue and got some international interest after their show. Ever since, the band have been playing numerous gigs: for instance, they have toured Germany numerous times and supported Swedish metal act Dynazty during their ‘Titanic Mass’ tour in Finland. These guys are known not only for their music, but also energetic and positive attitude which is present on and off stage.

During the years 2016-2018, Risto wrote and produced new material for his band's Wake The Nations next album ‘Heartrock’. It was done in cooperation with some of the best: for instance, Sören Kronqvist (Find Me, Joe Lynn Turner, One Desire), Thomas Vikström (Therion), Ilkka Wirtanen (The Nights, Reckless Love), to name a few. The end result being a solid yet diverse melodic rock album with stadion rock sounds, a hint of the 80’s, and interesting stories of life and love. In 2019, Wake the Nations released ‘Heartrock’ through a German label AOR Heaven. It continued the AOR/melodic rock route set by the first album, but was more refined and solid. Erik Mårtensson (Eclipse, W.E.T.) mixed and mastered 'Heartrock' and his awesome work is present from track one to the very last beat of the release. The album was received very well by the audience, especially within the German fanbase.