Anu Komsi, The Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra & Hannu Lintu
Biography Anu Komsi, The Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra & Hannu Lintu
Anu Komsi
Praised for her multifaceted musicianship and dynamic coloratura voice, Anu Komsi
appears regularly across Europe and in the USA. She is a versatile recitalist and chamber musician with a repertoire ranging from Renaissance to con- temporary music, and her 2011 performance in John Zorn’s La Machine de l’être at New York City Opera was described as ‘pyrotechnic grace’ in the New York Magazine. Engagements at leading opera houses such as the Finnish Na- tional Opera, Opéra Bastille, Théâtre du Châtelet, Oper Frankfurt and Staatsoper Stuttgart include some 50 roles, among them Lulu, Zerbinetta, Nannetta, Olympia, Micaela and Gilda. Anu Komsi also appears in contemporary works such as Lady Sarashina by Peter Eötvös, Philomela by James Dillon and George Benjamin’s Into the Little Hill, with a role especially written for her.
Anu Komsi has performed with orchestras such as the Berlin, Los Angeles and New York Philharmonics, the Wiener Symphoniker, Ensemble Modern and London Sinfonietta. Conductors with whom she has collaborated include Sir Roger Norrington, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Heinz Holliger, Sakari Oramo, Franz Welser-Möst and Alan Gilbert. Recent highlights include performances of Szy- manowski’s Six Songs of a Fairy-Tale Princess at the Berlin Philharmonie, Britten’s Les Illuminations at the Vienna Musikverein and a highly acclaimed début at the Salzburg Festival in Morton Feldman’s Neither.
Since 2006, Anu Komsi has been the artistic director of the West Coast Kok- kola Opera company, of which she is a founding member. Productions include Le Nozze di Figaro, Lulu and Sebastian Fagerlund’s Döbeln, commissioned by the company and released on BIS in a highly acclaimed recording in 2010. Anu Komsi has a wide-ranging discography on various labels, including, on BIS, the world première recording of Shostakovich’s Suite on Finnish Themes (BIS-CD- 1256). In 2008 Anu Komsi was honoured with an award from the Finnish Cul- tural Foundation.
