Annika Leino

Finnish dramatic spinto soprano Annika Leino combines guest engagements at Finnish National Opera and the Savonlinna Opera Festival with an active concert career. Her work at Savonlinna encompasses Micaëla in Carmen, Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni and Dama di Lady Macbeth in Macbeth. Her 2026 engagements include Abigaille in Verdi’s Nabucco at the festival.

At the Finnish National Opera, Ms. Leino has performed Liù in Turandot and Nedda/Colombina in Pagliacci, as well as covering Helmwige in Die Walküre. Other guest roles include the Governess in Britten’s The Turn of the Screw with the Lappeenranta City Orchestra and Wellgunde in Götterdämmerung at Eurajoki Bel Canto. Finnish opera forms a further part of her repertoire: she sang the First Lady in Joonas Kokkonen’s The Last Temptations at Tampere Opera in 2025 and has performed Eeva in Kimmo Hakola’s Rakkaus on väkevä kuin kuolema. At the Aleksanterin Teatteri she covered Mare in Mare ja hänen poikansa and Lenore in Die Loreley.

Ms. Leino maintains an active presence on the concert stage. Her oratorio and symphonic repertoire includes Verdi’s and Fauré’s Requiem, Rossini’s Petite messe solennelle and the soprano solo in Sibelius’s Kullervo. She collaborates regularly with pianists Jukka Nykänen and Kirill Kozlovski, and has worked with conductors including Andrea Sanguineti, Hannu Lintu and Ramón Tebar.

A graduate of the Sibelius Academy, University of the Arts Helsinki, Ms. Leino earned her Master of Music in classical performance and opera in 2018. Her roles with the Academy’s opera included Alice Ford in Falstaff, Helena in A Midsummer Night’s Dream and the Countess in Le nozze di Figaro. She also holds a Bachelor of Music in music education from Turku University of Applied Sciences. She won First Prize at the 2019 Kangasniemi National Singing Competition, was a finalist and special-prize recipient at the 2019 Lappeenranta National Singing Competition, and reached the semi-finals of the 2021 Competizione dell’Opera in Moscow.