Finnish National Opera

The year 1993 was a milestone in the history of Finnish opera, marking the completion of the new Opera House on Töölönlahti bay in Helsinki. This was a venue where the Finnish National Opera finally acquired the premises and state-of-the-art technology required for mounting large-scale productions. Today, the Finnish National Opera is held in high international renown.

Regular opera performances began in Finland exactly 120 years before the completion of the new Opera House, with the founding of the Finnish Opera in connection with the Finnish Theatre by Kaarlo Bergbom in 1873. Prior to that, opera had been performed in Finland sporadically by touring companies, and on occasion by Finnish amateurs, the first such production being Il barbiere di Siviglia in 1849. In 1956, the Finnish Opera was taken over by the Foundation of the Finnish National Opera and acquired its present name.

The new Opera House is suave Finnish architecture at its finest, designed by Eero Hyvämäki, Jukka Karhunen and Risto Parkkinen. It is situated close to the city centre in the proximity of major hotels, yet in a verdant setting. The spacious well-lit foyers offer a view of the bay and the park. The Opera House has two auditoriums, the main auditorium with 1,350 seats and Almi Hall, the studio stage, with 300 to 500 seats.

The Finnish National Opera caters to the entire nation, thanks to support from the Finnish government. Ticket prices at the bottom end of the scale are only 12 €, the price of a cinema ticket! The Finnish National Opera also stages performances free of charge. The Saturday chamber music concerts attract hundreds of visitors, and there are always free art exhibitions, production presentations and artist briefings going on. The Finnish National Opera also participates in the by now traditional Night of the Arts in August with a popular open-air concert.

The Finnish National Opera stages the world premiere of at least one Finnish opera every year. In the current season, the premiere works are Rasputin by Einojuhani Rautavaara and Suomalainen tapiiri (The Finnish Tapir) by Jouko Linjama. Finnish opera is well represented in the repertoire otherwise too; for instance, in autumn 2004 the Finnish National Opera will be staging Kaija Saariaho’s internationally successful opera L’amour de loin.

There is a highly international crowd behind the scenes. The Ballet, for instance, has dancers from no fewer than 17 countries. The official languages of the Finnish National Opera are Finnish and Swedish, but almost all European languages are used in the building.

The professional choir of the Finnish National Opera has 60 singers; the orchestra has 120 members and the ballet 90 dancers. The permanently engaged 30 solo singers are mostly Finnish, but there are guest artists from all around the world in almost every performance.

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The Finnish National Opera in figures

The Finnish National Opera has almost 300,000 visitors annually, equal to half the population of Helsinki. Taken as a proportion of the population, this is equivalent to the Metropolitan Opera in New York having 8 million visitors a year!

The Oop! department stages productions for children and tours school all over Finland. In 2002, these productions reached up to 24,000 children and adolescents.

There are about 300 performances every year, including concerts and audience briefings; there are 140 opera performances and 110 ballet performances annually. Every season, four to six new opera productions are premiered, and some 20 different operas are in the repertoire. The Ballet premieres four productions each season, two of which are contemporary choreographies, and has about 10 dance works in the repertoire altogether.