Melis Jaatinen

Contemporary music and the Nordic vocal tradition run through Finnish-Turkish mezzo-soprano Melis Jaatinen’s work in opera, concert and recital. Her freelance career has developed across the Nordic region, where collaborations with living composers sit alongside performances of the classical repertoire. A continuing association with the Oslo Philharmonic brought Mozart’s Requiem in March 2026, following Beethoven’s Missa solemnis with the orchestra in 2023 and with Trondheim Symphony Orchestra in 2024.

Ms. Jaatinen’s work with living composers encompasses the premieres of Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s opera UR, Olli Kortekangas’s oratorio VIA and Gisle Kverndokk’s song cycle Syngende natt, first performed in Oslo in 2023. On stage, she sang Hannah after in Laura Kaminsky’s As One in a Satakunta Music Festival production at Helsinki’s Alexander Theatre in October 2022, and Kay in Hans Abrahamsen’s Snedronningen at the Royal Danish Opera in 2019. She has also appeared in We – an unknown opera by Bach? at Norrlandsoperan.

Alongside new opera, her repertoire includes Polina in The Queen of Spades, sung at Savonlinna in 2018, and Cherubino, which she performed at Finnish National Opera in 2014. Her relationship with that house began as a soloist trainee from 2010 to 2012, when she sang Sesto in Giulio Cesare, Mercédès, Nancy in Albert Herring and Zara in the world premiere of Jüri Reinvere’s Puhdistus (The Purge). Later roles there included Flora in La traviata and Jamila in Robin Hood. Further engagements have taken her to Norwegian National Opera, Opera Sør, Theater Trier, Trondheim Opera and Helsinki Contemporary Opera.

Song and chamber music provide another setting for her work with Nordic repertoire. Her debut album, Impressions du Nord, appeared in 2022 with pianist Juho Alakärppä; other recordings include music by Sibelius, Grieg, Stravinsky and Pylkkänen. Recital and festival appearances have taken her to Oxford Lieder, the Oslo Opera Festival and Bard Music Festival, and to Musashino Civic Cultural Hall in Tokyo. Her wider concert repertoire includes Bach’s Mass in B minor and Handel’s Messiah.

Ms. Jaatinen was a finalist in the Wigmore Hall Song Competition in 2013. She holds a Master of Music from the Sibelius Academy, where she studied with Marjut Hannula, and trained with Barbro Marklund at the Norwegian Academy of Music. She also studied musicology at the University of Oslo. Her subsequent vocal development has included work with Brian Jauhiainen and Paul Farrington.