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About
The Finnish bass Timo Riihonen was born in 1983 in Mikkeli, Finland. He studied at the renowned Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, from where he graduated as Master of Arts in 2010. Already in the year 2008 he joined the International Opera Studio in Zürich, which made it possible for him to sing many roles at the Zürich Opera House.
Timo Riihonen has won many prizes and received scholarships in competitions from which the winning the mens series in the ”Lappeenranta Singing Competition” in 2008 stands out. Previous winners include Martti Talvela, Matti Salminen, Karita Mattila, and Jorma Hynninen. In 2007 he received the Matti Salminen Scholarship.
Between 2009 and 2013 Timo Riihonen was a member of the ensemble of Deutsche Oper am Rhein where he his roles included Sparafucile in Rigoletto, Colline in La Boheme, Angelotti in Tosca, Ratcliffe in Billy Budd and Zuniga in Carmen among others.
From 2013 until 2018 Timo Riihonen is a member of the Opera House in Kiel, where he expanded his repertoire to cover main roles. He sang the roles of Sarastro in The magic flute, Falstaff in The merry wives of Windsor, King Mark in Tristan and Isolde, Prince Gremin in Eugen Onegin, Bartolo in The marriage of Figaro, Alaskawolfjoe in The rise and fall of the town Mahagonny, Don Profondo in Il viaggio a Reims, Marcel in Les Hu- guenots, Daland in The flying Dutchman, Graf Waldner in Arabella, Banquo in Macbeth as well as Fasolt, Fafner and Hunding in the Ring of the Nibelungen.
Since 2016 Timo Riihonen has been engaged to sing at the world famous Bayreuther Festspiele in Parsifal (DVD 2017) and Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (DVD out in 2018) and Lohengrin. He has been invited to return to the festival annually until the year 2019.
Future roles include Filippo II (Don Carlos) in Helsinki in 2018 as well as in the Opera House in Graz, Austria in the season 2019/2020 and Sarastro in Staufer Festspiele by Stuttgart in 2018.
Timo Riihonen is a frequent guest in many opera houses in Europe where he has sung among others the following roles: Fafner in Das Rheingold in Teatro alla Scala as well as in the Berlin State Opera with Daniel Barenboim (DVD 2012), also as Fafner and Hunding in the Berlin Philharmonic (Live recording with Marek Janowski CD 2013). In Moscow Philharmonic he sang the role of Rocco from Fidelio, in Opéra Dijon and in Helsinki Il Commendatore (Don Giovanni), Fasolt, Fafner and Sarastro at the State Theatre of Hessen in Wiesbaden, Landgraf Hermann in the Latvian National Opera, Fasolt in the Finnish National Opera and the King in Aida at the Savonlinna Opera Festival.
Timo Riihonen has worked with world renowned conductors including Daniel Barenboim, Philippe Auguin, Philippe Jordan, Andris Nelsons, Marek Janowski, Leif Segerstam, Alexander Joel, Michael Boder, Carlo Rizzi, Nello Santi and with stage directors such as Barrie Kosky, Keith Warner, Uwe Erik Laufenberg, Grischa Asagaroff, Tatjana Gürbaca, Guy Cassiers, Guy Joosten, Robert Carsen, Christoph Loy and Jean-Yves Ruf.
As a concert and Lied singer Timo Riihonen has performed in the Tonhalle in Zürich, the Berlin Philharmonic, the Kuhmo Chamber Music Festival, the Ebracher Musiksommer festival, Goetheanum in Switzerland and the Tonhalle in Kiel among others. He has been a soloist in Beethovens 9. Symphony, J.S.Bach’s St. John and St. Matthew Passions, the F minor mass from Bruckner, Stabat Mater by Dvorak and Requiem by Mozart and by Verdi.