Savonlinna Opera - The annual summer festival in lakeland Finland

14–18 July

A massive structure of rough-hewn granite rising from a rocky islet, the castle at Savonlinna is the largest in Scandinavia. It was built in 1475 and frequently re-fortified during the next three centuries, for this was border country: Nordic occupancy alternated with Russian until modern times. 

Opera has been performed here in the courtyard since 1912, so it even pre-dates Verona as a festival in a spectacular historic setting. During the last few decades its artistic achievements have placed this festival among the best in the world, yet its unlikely and rather inaccessible location keeps the number of international visitors well below what it deserves.

The courtyard is backed by a starkly beautiful wall of rough medieval masonry: its huge gateway and precipitous staircase make a wonderful setting for productions of operas. Musically, the acoustically-designed temporary roof allows both intimate scenes and vast choral ensembles to sound at their best. In all three performances, the Savonlinna Festival Orchestra and Choir – picked from among the finest instrumentalists and singers in Scandinavia – will have the greatest opportunities to show their strength.

The lake district of eastern Finland is an area of gently beguiling beauty. Thousands of inter-connected lakes meet forests of birch and pine at an incredibly convoluted shoreline, the pattern varied with scattered patches of pasture and arable land neatly arranged around timber farmsteads. The scenery and pure air provide a restful and refreshing foil to nights at the opera. 

This is one of our more leisurely tours with plenty of free time around a gentle programme of visits and excursions.

20–25 July

Location, location, location … This oft-repeated estate agents’ mantra holds true even – or especially – for opera festivals. At almost all the most memorable of these summer gatherings the festival setting plays an important role, and nowhere is that more true than of Savonlinna, a small, pleasant town in the heart of Finland’s beautiful lakeland. In addition to waterscapes, forests and fresh air, this tranquil town boasts the magnificent castle of Olavinlinna, which in 2025 is celebrating its 550th anniversary. Built in 1475 as a fortress by the Swedes to deter Russian invaders, in the 20th century it found a more peaceful purpose as home to the Savonlinna Opera Festival, now one of the great annual events of the operatic calendar.

Savonlinna played an important role in the extraordinary flowering of modern Finnish opera in the 1970s, and Joonas Kokkonen’s The Last Temptations was for several years a fixture there. As part of the 2025 celebratory season this landmark work returns, starring today’s leading Finnish bass Mika Kares as the preacher Paavo Ruotsalainen, and audiences will get a chance to hear music by one of the most important Finnish composers after Sibelius.

Mika Kares has another major assignment at Savonlinna this coming summer: the title role in Modest Mussorgsky’s mighty opera Boris Godunov. The new production is by Nicola Raab, and though this work drawn from Russian history never loses its resonance, it will surely resonate all the more powerfully today in eastern Finland. The third opera on our itinerary is Giacomo Puccini’s swansong Turandot, among Savonlinna’s most admired stagings and here starring one of today’s most admired exponents of Turandot herself, the Polish soprano Ewa Płonka.

The tour begins with two nights in Helsinki, whose art and architecture are key to understanding the Finnish national movement that led to the country’s independence in 1917. Completing our cultural picture are visits to the architecturally significant Villa Kokkonen - the composer’s home designed by Alvar Aalto - and Sibelius’s house Ainola, sights within easy reach of Helsinki.