Camilla Nylund (born 11 June 1968) is a Finnish operatic soprano. She appears internationally in lyric-dramatic roles such as Beethoven's Leonore, Verdi's Elisabetta, and Wagner's Elisabeth and Sieglinde. She is especially known for portraying leading female characters in operas by Richard Strauss, (e.g. Marschallin, Arabella,

Ariadne Ariadne (; grc-gre, Ἀριάδνη; la, Ariadne) was a Cretan princess in Greek mythology. She was mostly associated with mazes and labyrinths because of her involvement in the myths of the Minotaur and Theseus. She is best known for havi ...

and Countess Madeleine). She has appeared at international festivals and the openings of the

Dresdner Frauenkirche The Dresden Frauenkirche (german: Dresdner Frauenkirche, , ''Church of Our Lady'') is a Lutheran church in Dresden, the capital of the German state of Saxony. Destroyed during the Allied firebombing of Dresden towards the end of World War II, ...

and the

Elbphilharmonie The Elbphilharmonie (; "Elbe Philharmonic Hall"), popularly nicknamed Elphi, is a concert hall in the HafenCity quarter of Hamburg, Germany, on the Grasbrook peninsula of the Elbe River. It is among the largest in the world. The new glassy con ...

Career

Born in

Vaasa Vaasa (; sv, Vasa, , Sweden ), in the years 1855–1917 as Nikolainkaupunki ( sv, Nikolajstad; literally meaning "city of Nicholas),

, Finland, Nylund first studied musicology in

Turku Turku ( ; ; sv, Åbo, ) is a city and former capital on the southwest coast of Finland at the mouth of the Aura River, in the region of Finland Proper (''Varsinais-Suomi'') and the former Turku and Pori Province (''Turun ja Porin lääni''; ...

, and voice at the

conservatoire A music school is an educational institution specialized in the study, training, and research of music. Such an institution can also be known as a school of music, music academy, music faculty, college of music, music department (of a larger ins ...

. She continued her studies at the

Mozarteum Mozarteum University Salzburg (German: ''Universität Mozarteum Salzburg'') is one of three affiliated but separate (it is actually a state university) entities under the “Mozarteum” moniker in Salzburg municipality; the International Mo ...

in Salzburg. After finishing her schooling in Austria, she became a member of the

Staatsoper Hannover Hanover State Opera (german: Staatsoper Hannover) is an opera company in Hanover, the state capital of Lower Saxony, Germany. The company is resident in the Hanover Opera House (), and is part of a publicly-funded umbrella performing arts organ ...

, followed by the

Semperoper The Semperoper () is the opera house of the Sächsische Staatsoper Dresden (Saxon State Opera) and the concert hall of the Staatskapelle Dresden (Saxon State Orchestra). It is also home to the Semperoper Ballett. The building is located on the ...

Dresden Dresden (, ; Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; wen, label= Upper Sorbian, Drježdźany) is the capital city of the German state of Saxony and its second most populous city, after Leipzig. It is the 12th most populous city of Germany, the fourth ...

, where she remained until 2002. Nylund was honoured there with the Christel-Goltz Prize - for roles such as Marie in Smetana's '' Die verkaufte Braut'', Agathe in Weber's ''

Der Freischütz ' ( J. 277, Op. 77 ''The Marksman'' or ''The Freeshooter'') is a German opera with spoken dialogue in three acts by Carl Maria von Weber with a libretto by Friedrich Kind, based on a story by Johann August Apel and Friedrich Laun from their 18 ...

'', and Fiordiligi in Mozart's '' Così fan tutte''. In the season of 2004/2005, she gained international acclaim by debuting three roles: Elisabeth in Wagner's ''

Tannhäuser Tannhäuser (; gmh, Tanhûser), often stylized, "The Tannhäuser," was a German Minnesinger and traveling poet. Historically, his biography, including the dates he lived, is obscure beyond the poetry, which suggests he lived between 1245 and ...

''. the title role in '' Salome'' by Richard Strauss at the

Cologne Opera The Cologne Opera (German language, German: Oper der Stadt Köln or Oper Köln) refers both to the main opera house in Cologne, Germany and to its resident opera company. History of the company From the mid 18th century, opera was performed in th ...

and the title role of Beethoven's ''

Fidelio ''Fidelio'' (; ), originally titled ' (''Leonore, or The Triumph of Marital Love''), Op. 72, is Ludwig van Beethoven's only opera. The German libretto was originally prepared by Joseph Sonnleithner from the French of Jean-Nicolas Bouilly, wi ...

'' at the Opernhaus Zürich. She appeared in the re-opening of the restored Frauenkirche in

in November of 2005, performing the soprano solo in Beethoven's ''

Missa solemnis {{Audio, De-Missa solemnis.ogg, Missa solemnis is Latin for Solemn Mass, and is a genre of musical settings of the Mass Ordinary, which are festively scored and render the Latin text extensively, opposed to the more modest Missa brevis. In French ...

'', conducted by

Fabio Luisi Fabio Luisi (born 17 January 1959) is an Italian conductor. He is currently principal conductor of the Danish National Symphony Orchestra, music director of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, and chief conductor of the NHK Symphony Orchestra. B ...

, alongside Birgit Remmert, Christian Elsner and René Pape. In 2008, Nylund appeared at the

Salzburg Festival The Salzburg Festival (german: Salzburger Festspiele) is a prominent festival of music and drama established in 1920. It is held each summer (for five weeks starting in late July) in the Austrian town of Salzburg, the birthplace of Wolfgang Ama ...

for the first time, presenting the title role of Dvořák's '' Rusalka''. She starred as Elisabeth in Wagner's ''

at the Bayreuth Festival from 2011 until 2014'', and had her festival-debut as Sieglinde (''

Die Walküre (; ''The Valkyrie''), WWV 86B, is the second of the four music dramas that constitute Richard Wagner's ''Der Ring des Nibelungen'' (English: ''The Ring of the Nibelung''). It was performed, as a single opera, at the National Theatre Munich on ...

)'' in 2017. In 2014, she also appeared in the title role of ''

Ariadne auf Naxos (''Ariadne on Naxos''), Op. 60, is a 1912 opera by Richard Strauss with a German libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal. The opera's unusual combination of elements of low commedia dell'arte with those of high opera seria points up one of the work's ...

'' at the

Oper Frankfurt The Oper Frankfurt (Frankfurt Opera) is a German opera company based in Frankfurt. Opera in Frankfurt am Main has a long tradition, with many world premieres such as Franz Shrek's ''Der ferne Klang'' in 1912, '' Fennimore und Gerda'' by Frede ...

, as the Marschallin in ''

Der Rosenkavalier (''The Knight of the Rose'' or ''The Rose-Bearer''), Op. 59, is a comic opera in three acts by Richard Strauss to an original German libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal. It is loosely adapted from the novel ''Les amours du chevalier de Faublas'' ...

'' at the Grand Théâtre de Luxembourg, and in the soprano part of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles. In January 2017, she took part in the opening of the

, performing the soprano part in Beethoven's Missa solemnis alongside

Sarah Connolly Dame Sarah Patricia Connolly (born 13 June 1963) is an English mezzo-soprano. Although best known for her baroque and classical roles, Connolly has a wide-ranging repertoire which has included works by Wagner as well as various 20th-century ...

, Klaus Florian Vogt and

Luca Pisaroni Luca Pisaroni (born 1975) is an Italian operatic bass-baritone, known for his roles in Mozart's operas, but who has steadily expanded his repertoire into the Baroque as well as moving beyond into Rossini. Early life Although born in Ciudad Bol ...

with the

Hamburger Symphoniker The Symphoniker Hamburg (''Hamburg Symphony Orchestra'') is a German orchestra based in Hamburg, Germany. Founded in 1957, it is one of the city's three largest orchestras. The Hamburg Symphony Orchestra is the orchestra in residence in the Lae ...

conducted by

Jeffrey Tate Sir Jeffrey Philip Tate (28 April 19432 June 2017) was an English conductor of classical music. Tate was born with spina bifida and had an associated spinal curvature. After studying medicine at the University of Cambridge and beginning a me ...

. In 2018, Nylund appeared as the Countess in '' Capriccio'' at the Oper Frankfurt, staged by

Brigitte Fassbaender Brigitte Fassbaender (; born 3 July 1939), is a German mezzo-soprano opera singer and a stage director. From 1999 to 2012 she was intendant (managing director) of the Tyrolean State Theatre in Innsbruck, Austria. She holds the title Kammersäng ...

. In April 2018, Camilla Nylund first sang an excerpt of

Tristan und Isolde ''Tristan und Isolde'' (''Tristan and Isolde''), WWV 90, is an opera in three acts by Richard Wagner to a German libretto by the composer, based largely on the 12th-century romance Tristan and Iseult by Gottfried von Strassburg. It was comp ...

alongside

Jonas Kaufmann Jonas Kaufmann (born 10 July 1969) is a German operatic tenor. He is best known for the versatility of his repertoire, performing a variety of opera roles in multiple languages in recitalTommasini, Anthony (21 February 2014)"A Tenor Finds Energy ...

with the Boston Symphony Orchestra under Andris Nelssons at Carnegie Hall. In May 2019 she appeared as the Empress in a new production of Richard Strauss's ''

Die Frau ohne Schatten ' (''The Woman without a Shadow''), Op. 65, is an opera in three acts by Richard Strauss with a libretto by his long-time collaborator, the poet Hugo von Hofmannsthal. It was written between 1911 and either 1915 or 1917. When it premiered at the V ...

'' directed by Victor Huguet at the

Wiener Staatsoper The Vienna State Opera (, ) is an opera house and opera company based in Vienna, Austria. The 1,709-seat Renaissance Revival venue was the first major building on the Vienna Ring Road. It was built from 1861 to 1869 following plans by August Si ...

. She was also awarded the title of Österreichische Kammersängerin within that time. Later that year she made her

Metropolitan Opera The Metropolitan Opera (commonly known as the Met) is an American opera company based in New York City, resident at the Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center, currently situated on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. The company is oper ...

debut as Marschallin in

. In the beginning of 2020, she starred in another production of Der Rosenkavalier by Andre Heller at the

Berlin State Opera The (), also known as the Berlin State Opera (german: Staatsoper Berlin), is a listed building on Unter den Linden boulevard in the historic center of Berlin, Germany. The opera house was built by order of Prussian king Frederick the Great from ...

alongside Nadine Sierra and Günther Groissböck. During the Covid-19 pandemic Nylund continued to perform as much as possible, headlining the Lech Classic Festival in the Austrian state of

Vorarlberg Vorarlberg ( , ; gsw, label= Vorarlbergisch, Vorarlbearg, , or ) is the westernmost state () of Austria. It has the second-smallest geographical area after Vienna and, although it also has the second-smallest population, it is the state with the ...

alongside Piotr Beczala and participating in the recording of a concert with the

Wiener Symphoniker The Vienna Symphony (Vienna Symphony Orchestra, german: Wiener Symphoniker) is an Austrian orchestra based in Vienna. Its primary concert venue is the Vienna Konzerthaus. In Vienna, the orchestra also performs at the Musikverein and at the The ...

in celebration of Franz Lehar's 150th birthday. She rejoined Heller for "André Hellers Hauskonzerte", a project aired by ORF III in November 2020 that first saw Nylund's abilities not only as a classical soprano, but within multiple other genres such as chanson, jazz and musical theatre. 2021 saw her debuts in the title roles of Janacek's ''

Jenůfa ''Její pastorkyňa'' (''Her Stepdaughter''; commonly known as ''Jenůfa'' ) is an opera in three acts by Leoš Janáček to a Czech libretto by the composer, based on the play ''Její pastorkyňa'' by Gabriela Preissová. It was first performed ...

at the Berlin State Opera as well as

Puccini Giacomo Puccini ( Lucca, 22 December 1858Bruxelles, 29 November 1924) was an Italian composer known primarily for his operas. Regarded as the greatest and most successful proponent of Italian opera after Verdi, he was descended from a long ...

Tosca ''Tosca'' is an opera in three acts by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa. It premiered at the Teatro Costanzi in Rome on 14 January 1900. The work, based on Victorien Sardou's 1887 French-language drama ...

in her long-awaited return to the

Finnish National Opera The Finnish National Opera and Ballet ( fi, Suomen Kansallisooppera ja -baletti; sv, Finlands Nationalopera och -balett) is a Finnish opera company and ballet company based in Helsinki. It is headquartered in the Opera House on the coast of the T ...

''. In June of the same year, Nylund was Artist in Residence at the newly founded Brixen Classics Festival and once again worked with André Heller on another project for ORF III, interpreting parts of The Great American Songbook with the RSO Wien and

Marin Alsop Marin Alsop ( �mɛər.ɪn ˈæːl.sɑːp born October 16, 1956) is an American conductor, the first woman to win the Koussevitzky Prize for conducting and the first conductor to be awarded a MacArthur Fellowship. She is music director laureate ...

. She debuted the role of "a woman" in Schönberg's ''

Erwartung ' (''Expectation''), Op. 17, is a one-act monodrama in four scenes by Arnold Schoenberg to a libretto by . Composed in 1909, it was not premiered until 6 June 1924 in Prague conducted by Alexander Zemlinsky with Marie Gutheil-Schoder as the sop ...

'' at the Frankfurt Opera House in January of 2022 and is due to make her first appearances as Isolde and Brünnhilde (

Ring Cycle (''The Ring of the Nibelung''), WWV 86, is a cycle of four German-language epic music dramas composed by Richard Wagner. The works are based loosely on characters from Germanic heroic legend, namely Norse legendary sagas and the ''Nibelun ...

) at the Zürich Opera House until the end of the year.

Recordings (selection)

*2004: Ludwig van Beethoven: ''

'' (with

and Nikolaus Harnoncourt,

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kind ...

) *2011: Camilla Nylund: Transfiguration - Wagner & Strauss, Arias & Scenes (with

Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra The Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra ( Finnish:''Tampere Filharmonia'') is a Finnish orchestra based in Tampere. Founded in 1930, and maintained by the municipality of Tampere since 1947, the orchestra is currently based in the Tampere Hall. The ...

Hannu Lintu Hannu Petteri Lintu (born 13 October 1967) is a Finnish conductor. Biography Lintu was born in Rauma. He studied piano and cello at the Turku Conservatory and at the Sibelius Academy. He also studied conducting with Atso Almila, and later with ...

) *2013: Erich Wolfgang Korngold:

Die Tote Stadt ' (German for ''The Dead City''), Op. 12, is an opera in three acts by Erich Wolfgang Korngold set to a libretto by Paul Schott, a collective pseudonym for the composer and his father, Julius Korngold. It is based on the 1892 novel '' Bruges-la-Mo ...

(DVD), (live from Finnish National Opera, with Klaus Florian Vogt) *2014: Christoph Willibald Gluck:

Iphigenia in Aulis ''Iphigenia in Aulis'' or ''Iphigenia at Aulis'' ( grc, Ἰφιγένεια ἐν Αὐλίδι, Īphigéneia en Aulídi; variously translated, including the Latin ''Iphigenia in Aulide'') is the last of the extant works by the playwright Euripide ...

(conductor: Christoph Spering) *2014: Richard Wagner:

(live from the Bayreuth Festival) *2015: Richard Strauss:

(Frankfurt Opera, conductor: Sebastian Weigle) *2015: Richard Strauss Gala,

(with

Christine Goerke Christine Goerke (born 1969) is an American dramatic soprano. Early life and education The daughter of Richard Goerke and Marguerite Goerke, Goerke was born in 1969 in New York State. She grew up in Medford, New York, where she attended Tremont ...

, Anja Harteros,

Christian Thielemann Christian Thielemann (born 1 April 1959) is a German conductor. He is currently chief conductor of the Staatskapelle Dresden. He was artistic director of the Salzburg Easter Festival from 2013 to 2022, and a regular conductor at the Bayreuth Fe ...

) * 2017: Richard Strauss: ''

'', live from

De Nederlandse Opera The Dutch National Opera (DNO; formerly De Nederlandse Opera, now De Nationale Opera in Dutch) is a Dutch opera company based in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Its present home base is the Dutch National Opera & Ballet housed in the Stopera building, a m ...

, Nylund as Marschallin,

Hanna-Elisabeth Müller Hanna-Elisabeth Müller (born 3 May 1985 at Mannheim) is a German soprano in opera, concert and recitals. Life Musical education As a child, Müller took violin lessons with Dinu Hartwich and later joined a choir. Since the age of 11, she ...

as Sophie, Paula Murrihy as Octavian, conducted by Marc Albrecht. * 2017: Franz Lehár: Der Graf von Luxemburg (with Daniel Behle) * 2020: Richard Wagner: "Wagner at Wahnfried"; Siegfried Idyll, Wesendonck-Lieder (Bayreuth Festival Orchestra,

) * 2022: Erich Wolfgang Korngold:

(CD), (live from Finnish National Opera, with Klaus Florian Vogt)

Awards

* 1995:

Lilli Lehmann Medal The Lilli Lehmann Medal is an award by the Mozarteum International Foundation, named in honour of soprano Lilli Lehmann. Recipients Among the people who have received it are: * Ruth Kemper * Margaret Halstead, 1933 * Irmgard Seefried * George ...

of the

* 2000: Christel-Goltz Prize * 2008: ''

Kammersänger Kammersänger (male) or Kammersängerin (female), abbreviated Ks. or KS, is a German honorific title for distinguished singers of opera and classical music. It literally means "chamber singer". Historically, the title was bestowed by princes or ...

in'' of Saxony * 2013: Culture Prize of Sweden * 2013: Pro Finlandia Medal of the

Order of the Lion of Finland The Order of the Lion of Finland ( fi, Suomen Leijonan ritarikunta; sv, Finlands Lejons orden) is one of three official orders in Finland, along with the Order of the Cross of Liberty and the Order of the White Rose of Finland. The President ...

* 2019: ''

in'' of Austria

References

External links

* * * ;Television * * ;Performances * * * * * Media:
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Spotify {{DEFAULTSORT:Nylund, Camilla 1968 births Living people Finnish operatic sopranos Mozarteum University Salzburg alumni People from Vaasa 20th-century Finnish women opera singers 21st-century Finnish women opera singers Finnish expatriates in Germany