Biography

Finnish tenor Tuomas Katajala is one of the most versatile and sought-after Scandinavian tenors and has achieved noticeable success not just as an opera singer, but as a concert singer as well. He studied at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki as well as in Rome and Amsterdam and has a longstanding and close relationship with the Finnish National Opera in Helsinki and the Savonlinna Opera Festival, where he made his stage debut as Tamino/Die Zauberflöte. Following this, he was accepted into the master class at the Accademia Rossiniana and undertook the role of Libenskopf in Il Viaggio a Reims under the baton of Alberto Zedda at the Rossini Festival in Pesaro.

Past seasons’ opera highlights include, among others, Tamino/Die Zauberflöte at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, Staatsoper Unter den Linden Berlin, Opéra de Lille and in Tampere, Almaviva/Il barbiere di Siviglia at Komische Oper Berlin, Ferrando/Così fan tutte at Seattle Opera, Steuermann/Der fliegende Holländer in Helsinki and in a concert performance with the Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Rome, Don Ottavio/Don Giovanni at Finnish National Opera and the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow, as well as Belmonte/Die Entführung aus dem Serail at the Savonlinna Opera Festival.

In 2019, he made his debut as Max in Der Freischütz on the occasion of a concert tour with concerts in Vienna, Brussels, Caen, Luxemburg, Aix-en-Provence and at Ludwigsburger Schlossfestspiele. This engagement marked a change in repertoire and was followed by debuts as Loge/Rheingold at the Finnish National Opera, Idomeneo in Tel Aviv and, most recently, Hoffegut/Die Vögel in Strasbourg.

Katajala’s vast concert- and oratorio repertoire includes the key works by J.S. Bach, Handel, Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Bruckner, Mahler and Britten, which he performed at renowned concert halls and festivals in the USA (i.a. Avery Fisher Hall in New York), France (Salle Pleyel in Paris), Germany (Laeiszhalle Hamburg), Portugal (Gulbenkian), Scandinavia, Spain, the UK (Glyndebourne Festival), and Japan. 

Tuomas Katajala worked with conductors such as Vladimir Ashkenazy, Kent Nagano, Klaus Mäkelä, Pablo Heras-Casado, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Mikko Franck, Susanna Mälkki, Eivind Gullberg Jensen, Hannu Lintu, and Santtu-Matias Rouvali.

In Season 2022/23 Tuomas was on stage as Tamino/Zauberflöte at the Finnish National Opera as well as in Savonlinna, and as Max/Der Freischütz at Theater an der Wien, among others.
In addition, he could be heard in Beethoven's Symphony no 9 with the Wiener Symphoniker under Klaus Mäkelä, in Britten's "Serenade for tenor and horn" with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, in the title roles of Parsifal and Oedipus Rex, both with the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano, and as Loge in a concert performance of Das Rheingold in Singapore.

Projects in season 2023/24 include role debuts as Lohengrin at Savonlinna Opera Festival and as Erik/Der fliegende Holländer in Beijing, as well as a new production of Poulenc’s Dialogues des Carmélites/Chevalier de la Force at the Finnish National Opera.

His concert engagements in this season count the opening concert of the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano at the Scala (Mahler’s Lied von der Erde), Lili Boulanger’s Faust et Hélène with the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra under Hannu Lintu, as well as further concerts in Italy, Portugal and Finland.

Projects of the upcoming season 2024/25 include his debut as Pollux in Strauss’ Die Liebe der Danae in Genoa, Max/Der Freischütz at Opera Leipzig, Idomeneo in concert with the Helsinki
Baroque Orchestra with performances in Helsinki, Amsterdam (Concertgebouw) and Herne (Tage alter Musik festival), and Erik/Der fliegende Holländer in concert with the Luxembourg Philharmonic under Tarmo Peltokoski.
Additional concert projects bring him to Lisbon, Toulouse, Kokkola and Kuopio.

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Artist Website

www.tuomaskatajala.com

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Photo: Heikki TuuliPortrait
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Photo: Elina Katajala

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Photo: Elina Katajala

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Photo: Elina Katajala

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Photo: Elina Katajala

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Audio
Bach's "St. John Passion" on Good Friday from the Kallio Church in Helsinki 

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Video
Beethoven's Symphony No 9 with the Oslo Philharmonic and under the baton of Klaus Mäkelä ( Solo: 54:00) 
Beethoven's "Missa solemnis" under Hannu Lintu at the Savonlinna Opera Festival (Solo & Ensemble 35:15 - 39:15)
Mahler Symphony No 8 under Hannu Lintu in Helsinki  

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