Anna-Kristiina Kaappola, Soprano, In Recital with Mika Rännäli, Piano in a special performance including World Premiere Song Cycles by Mika Rännäli and William Maselli Date : Friday, May 22, 2009 Location : Weill Hall in Carnegie Hall, NYC

Anna-Kristiina Kaappola - A resident of Helsinki and Berlin, Finnish-born soprano Anna- Kristiina Kaappola pursued her studies at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki. She then joined the Opera Studio and later on the permanent ensemble of the Finnish National Opera where she has been performing an impressive number of parts until today. Today, the operatic and concert repertoire of her versatile soprano encompasses a wide range of lyrical and coloratura parts, including any style between old and contemporary music. Ms. Kaappola’s first guest engagements have taken her to Frankfurt, Riga, Tel Aviv and to the Savonlinna Opera Festival, where she has been singing regularly since the early Nineties. Her international career took an important turn in 2003 while guesting in Berlin as Queen of the Night at the Deutsche Oper as well as the Staatsoperunter den Linden, and namely as Konstanze at the Konzerthaus Berlin together with the Academy for Old Music. Subesequently a fruitful contact has been established with conductor Jos van Immerseel and his orchestra Anima Eterrna in Brussels. Today, Ms Kaappola is a much sought-after Queen of the Night, with regular performances at the Staatsoper Berlin as well as at the Deutsche Oper (lately at the Waldbühne Open Air in July 2007), in Leipzig, Dresden, Frankfurt, and Hamburg.

Mika Rännäli has established his position as one of the most extraordinary and intriguing artists of his generation. After winning the Artist International Auditions in New York, Mika Rännäli played his New York debut at the Weill Recital Hall in Carnegie Hall in December 1999, after which Harris Goldsmith, the critic of The New York Concert Review wrote: "Mika Rannali, gave a truly impressive account of himself. Although he is a technically exciting virtuoso, Rannali "plays like a composer" in the best sense: His wonderfully penetrating lucidity unfailingly clarified the style, content, emotional ambience and architectural structure of all the music he chose to illuminate. Mika Rännäli has toured extensively in Scandinavia, central and southern Europe, Japan and the USA. He has appeared with the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra, the Tapiola Sinfonietta, the Sinfonia Lahti, the Tampere Philharmonic, the Ostrobothnian Chamber Orchestra, the Oulu Symphony Orchestra, the Kuopio Symphony Orchestra, the Biel-Bienne Symphony Orchestra (Switzerland), the Flawiler Chamber Orchestra (Switzerland).