rocknroll_n_blues_queens | This New Year, I salute The Queen of Metal, The One and Only Tarja Turunen

The Tarja Turunen fronted iteration of Finnish band Nightwish was one of the pioneering metal groups who were fronted by a woman with towering vocal abilities, and still in my opinion remains the standard by which such bands are judged. And the fact they became a metal band in the first place was directly because of the strength of Tarja's voice. According to Wikipedia...

At Christmas break 1996 her former classmate Tuomas Holopainen invited her to join his new acoustic mood music project. She immediately agreed. At the first recording session it became apparent, that due to her classical singing lessons, Turunens voice had become much more powerful than Holopainen had in mind from their school days. At the following band practices Emppu Vuorinen used an electric guitar instead of the acoustic guitar because he felt that it better fitted to her voice. Holopainen finally decided to form Nightwish as a metal band. He later on explained, that the band mates bit by bit realised, that Turunen's voice had become too dramatic for acoustic mood music, so they came to the conclusion, that the music had to be massive too.^[4] Thus Turunen as a founding member was at the same time influential on the musical style of Nightwish.^[5]MORE

She learned the piano while young, but it was her astonishing vocal ability that commanded everyone's attention and she immediately entered extensive training for it. Said voice is classified as a lyric soprano which is

a type of operatic soprano that has a warm quality with a bright, full timbre which can be heard over an orchestra. ...Lyric sopranos have a range from approximately middle C (C4) to "high D" (D6).[1] There is a tendency to divide lyric sopranos into two groups, light & full.[2]MORE

Nightwish - 17 Over the Hills and Far Away （End of An Era）

Nightwish Sleeping sun (live)

On the occasion of the release of their most successful album, Once Tarja had a lot to say about her use of her voice in the band's songs.Tarja Turunen:
The illuminate vocalist of Nightwish.

What was the most challenging thing to you personally when thinking of the whole making of ONCE? Has it has become sort of a trademark for Tuomas by now, he just never underestimates his skills to write either "too-taken-for-granted" song structures or lyrics for Nightwish, so didn't you have any problems to fit your vocal parts to some of his songs that probably felt kind of tricky or complicated at first either structure or lyric-wise?

Hmm... that's a quite hard question... now let me think for a second. Well, according to some of my principles in general, when I should go a studio and lay down my vocal parts to some new song, I always tend to talk with Tuomas in what kind mood I probably may be at that day. The basic rule for me personally to sing songs that Tuomas has written, depends on my mood really. If I may a bit angry or frustrated or even aggressive, then it's always easier for me to try out some of those heavier and more aggressive songs by nature that he (Tuomas) has written. If I feel tired or somehow lazy, then there's even not much point to try out those types of songs in the first place you know what I'm saying? But of course Tuomas also writes songs where I should try to change my singing style from more mellow vocal parts to more aggressive vocal parts, so in that sense I just have to give the best out of me, no matter what mood I may be at. For example the 9th song on ONCE called "Ghost Love Score" is the type of a song which demanded me a lot because the song has three different parts that are very different from each other structure-wise, even in those three different parts there's many minor little parts where I had to change my singing style from one type of mood to another type of mood and that was quite a task in itself. People should keep in their minds that my voice is only one instrument amongst other instruments and using my voice its own separate instrument is quite challenging. I honestly think that with this album for the very first time in my life, I have better managed to become one of the instruments in Nightwish's music than with any of our previous albums, without thinking too much that there's my voice versus an arsenal of other instruments on ONCE. But I do also confess that ONCE was more challenging album to me personally to fit my vocal parts in for sure. But as I think I managed to stay in an amazingly positive mood during all these months when we were recording the album, it turned out to be kind of an easy album for me to do after all. Probably one of those things that made it such an easy album for me this time, was the fact I wasn't forced to be in the studio from early 10AM to 10PM; it was more like being in the studio for example from 10AM to 1PM for me, ha-ha!! I may have sung my vocal parts to 1 or 2 songs only at maximum in a day. And that was the biggest difference compared to my own working methods of the sessions of our previous album CENTURY CHILD.MORE

Here's my everlasting favorite song:

Nightwish - 14 Ghost Love Score （End of An Era） Live

Her split from Nightwish was acrimonious

Tarja Turunen press conf (with SUBTITLES) / post NW break up

but she went on to a successful solo career.

I Walk Alone - Tarja Turunen

And the spilt allowed her to move from just the vocalist for Tuomas' vision, to composer and songwriter in her own right as well as player of instruments aside from her voice.

Tarja Turunen, 'Until My Last Breath' -- Video from 2nd album

and here she is playing and singing in Sao Paulo.

Tarja Turunen - Oasis [HQ]

Website

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Personally, I, like many fans think that Nightwish will never be the same without her. But I'm thankful for the music she made with them, and appreciate her solo efforts now as well. Here's a recent interview:Get ready to rock:Interview: TARJA TURUNEN

The former vocalist of the million selling Nightwish is now a best selling artist in her own right. In 2007 she recorded her English language debut the gold and platinum award winning 'My Winter Story' album.

Three years on she's also slipped into the role of song writer and producer on the forthcoming follow-up 'What Lies Beneath', not to mention a star turn on 'The Good Die Young', the lead single from the Scorpions final album 'Sting In The Tail' .

Tarja talks to Pete Feenstra about her burgeoning career and future aspirations.

You've been described by your PR as 'Queen of Metal Opera'. Is that how you see yourself?

Well (laughs) that's quite a lot to say. Really all I do is to try and do my very best. I enjoy the beautiful freedom I have to express myself both as a person and in my musical life as an artist. And that sometimes means I have been working in different musical genres, but really I'm guided by how I feel and how music moves me.

For example, I'm now working on my second album - in fact it's been nearly two years - and I feel stronger than ever in terms of the music. The songs are almost there and I know what I want.

I'm clearer about what I wish to do. So Opera and Metal labels don't really apply. It's more about how I feel about the music and the direction that the music takes you in rather than writing for a particular kind of genre.

You've started to write your own songs on 'What Lies Beneath'. Was that a big step for you?
Yes it was but in a way it was a natural thing, a sort of progression because of my experience from what happened before. The whole project has been much easier for me this time. Because of having worked on my first album I have a lot more experience of recording and what is required to get things done. It was because of having gone through that whole process before that I was able to start writing.
I still like 'My Winter Storm', but I know a lot more now and I know this album is a lot stronger in terms of songs, production, direction etc.MORE