Tarja dla SRM / 2006

Patty

Female singer wanted. Answer to “Finnish exile soprano”

It’s not very fun to get sacked. Even less if your last employer gives you crappy references and spread them all over the net for everyone to see. It sucks wheter the crappy references holds any truth or not. Because of this, it’s not really strange that Tarja Turunen sounds slightly bitter when I finally get the right number and reaches her in a rainy Buenos Aires, where she’s currently living together with her husband, the manager and – according to some – the archdemon Marcelo Cabuli.

Far away from the homeland Finland, she is resting and trying to find some new strength after the dreadful events that took place right after the spectacular ending of her last tour together with Nightwish.

Like a lightning from a clear sky, the other members handed over a letter that told her that and why she couldn’t be a member of the band anymore. A letter that was also published on the band’s own website.

In the letter, Tarja is described as diva who gave priority to her own solo career and her social life, rather than planning her perfomances together with the band. Her husband, Marcelo was described as the person who changed the once so beloved and friendly finn.

Just a few days before I spoke to Tarja, the official Nightwish book had been released. First in Kitte (of course) and then the day after in the rest of Finland. The book is written by Marko “Mape” Olilla and he describes, from the few pages translated into English published on the net, that Marcelo is a cold businessman who has his wife into a strangling grip.

According to the book, all the contracts signed by Tarja is unvalid until Marcelo has signed them. It is also said that he has the full cotrol over all her money until ten years after the expiring of the contract. According to my point of view, this sounds like a slaverycontract, but Tarja doesn’t want to comment anything about the matter since she hasn’t read the book herself.
”I will read it, but until then, I do not want to comment antything written in it”.

She is concerned about the book since her own participation in the book was reduced just before the end of the writing progress. The original plan was that the author would come and visit her in her home in Finland for a couple of days, talking to her. This was cancelled without any further explanation, and suddenly, the deadline for the book was shortened.

“Then Mape called me in the middle of the night and we made an hour long interview on the phone. It’s not much, but at least I made an interview and this is important for a book about Nightwish.

Well, I imagine that the sopran should be able to answer my questions about her contract with her husband without her reading the book, so I tell her what I read in the translations. And runs straight into a wall.
“You’ve got that from the book and I told you that I do not want to comment it until I have read it”.
“It doesn’t matter if you have read the book or not. Can’t you answer how it is?”.
”No, she says with a sigh. I do not want to go into details about what the band has been telling in their interviews”.
“But I am not asking you to comment the book. Can’t you just answer if your contract with Marcelo looks like it is mentioned or not?”.
“But this information comes from the book. It is very private”.
“I understand, but is it true that Marcelo has the full power of your economy ten years after the contract has expired?”.
“This is wrong information. I can tell you that, but I do not want to comment this”.

The end of an era

Apparently, we won’t come any further in this matter, but since Tarja said that she would read the book, perhaps we can go into this matter some other time. For the moment, there are other controversiers to discuss. Like End of an Era – the live DVD that was recorded during the last show. It is going to be released in a few days together with a documentary. But for a while, it looked like it was going to be released everyhere but in Finland. Tarja and her husband refused to give it their blessing until they had seen it. Which sounds like a pretty modest request. But then I talked to Tuomas Holopainen recently (last number of SRM) he commented the past bandmember’s statment as bullshit. Of course Tarja could have seen the movie if she just had asked, but nothing had been heard from her. When I mention this to Tarja, she laughs.

”Why should I call them. They haven’t called me in six months and I was the one who got sacked. But it’s like it’s always been in the band. I just thought that if this was the last release with the band, it is important for me, and the rest of the world that it is good. I didn’t beg on my knees, but I think that I have a right to see my last release with the band. To perform in Hartwall Arena is a dream for most Finnish bands and we had the chance to do it. I was so happy and the concert was probably the best one we ever did. But now... despite that fact that I am a Finn, it feels like me and the band is speaking two different languages”.

The end of a friendship?

When it comes about speaking different languages. The one’s with a good memory might recall that the vocalist made a rather strange statement. In an interview last year for the website Tarja Turunen Fan, she was asked wheter she and Tuomas would ever be friends again. She answered that you cannot be friends again if you have never been friends. I ask Tarja to comment this statement and she sticks with it, unprepared for a quote of an interview I made with her two years ago.

“Friendship means to me, that you keep in touch with eachother, phone them on a daily basis and go out partying with them. I share my thoughts with my friends and I need them”.

Tarja tells that she knew all the Nightwish members from their school in Kitee and used to study music together with Tuomas who played clarinette, but who never spoke to Tarja. Although she knew the family since Tuomas mother was her piano teacher. Later she moved away from Kitee and it was when she came on a visit that Tuomas contacted her and asked her to sing on his demo.
“We didn’t even know eachother. The band wasn’t built on a friendship or anything like that. Sure we got along in the band and laughed and went out together. But that was only on tour. Not on our private time. That is not friendship for me. I know that a lot of people are upset about that I said that we were never friends, but this is how it was”.
“When I made this interview with you 2004 I asked you how it felt to sing the self biography songs from Century Child and you told me: “I have to create an image in my head when I sing so that I do not think of Tuomas, because that would have been impossible. So I am always thinking about someone else in the same position. Tuomas is such a good friend that I cannot think of him in that way. In those deep situations.”
“Aaaahh OK. (silence) I can tell you that Tuomas has never been a friend like the way I look at friendship.

Begninning of an era

The exact length of time hasn’t been counted yet, but approximately it took about a minute until the speculations about a reunion of the band had started after the announcement that Tarja was fired. Probably a little bit sooner. Tarja sounds pretty sceptical to a reunion like Tuomas did in the last interview.

“They haven’t called me yet and we are not talking to eachother, so a reunion feels pretty distant. For the moment I am focusing on feeling good again. I have been through hell these past months and I do not want to throw myself into thoughts about this for the moment. But I can tell you that a lot of things would have to change for a possible reunion. And most important: They haven’t called yet, ha ha.”

Now Tarja and Marcelo has signed a contract with the German record company Universal and she is working with her first solo album.

“It is a long way to go. The album is planned to be released next year, and probably not in the begnning of it. It is a very ambitious project I’ve been planning, but we’ll see what will come out of it”.

“A lot of you fans looks rather gothic, so I predicted that your new album would be pretty gothic, or am I totally wrong?”.

“Hmm, we’ll see. During my time with Nightwish, I learned to appreciate metal and I want to bring some of it in my solo career. But in the same time I have an opportunity to do things that a metal band cannot do. If a band like that would have three piano ballads on the album, the audience might say, huh, is this metal? But I am a vocalist and I want to show that I can express many different feelings. It won’t be a metal album, but it will include metal and classical music. And of course something that the gothic fans will like!”

“Did I just hear a relief sigh?”.