Artistic Director of Helsingin Koominen Ooppera. Opera Stage Director. Dramaturg for opera and concerts.
For detailed CV please contact laura.akerlund@koominenooppera.fi or Linkedin.
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Biography
Born into family of entrepreneurs and visual artists, Laura Åkerlund chose classical music on her own early on. She wanted to become a classical pianist, until a hand injury at the age of 17 forced her to a six month ban piano playing. By all of this free time, she decided to educate herself about opera, which had dramatic coincidences when she saw Anna Netrebko and Rolando Villazon in La Traviata. This form of art that combines cinematic possibilities, the human emotion and the power of music changed her life.
She studied piano first privately since childhood, then theory and lied at the Conservatory of Helsinki, Musicology and art history at the University of Helsinki, Opera Stage Directing at Sibelius-Academy, and business and international management at Aalto University.
Since 2006 Laura Åkerlund has worked as a stage director and in the teams of stage directors Kirill Serebrennikov, Calixto Bieito, Peter Sellars, David Bösch, Johanna Freundlich, Erik Söderblom in opera houses and festivals such as Komische Oper Berlin, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Oper Stuttgart, Bayerische Staatsoper, Finnish National Opera, Baltic Sea Festival, Grimeborn Opera Festival, Helsinki Festival, Turku Music Festival, Musica Nova Festival in Finland, Germany, England, Sweden and Russia.
Leadership experience Åkerlund has gained as the Head of Dramaturgy at the Badisches Staatstheater Karlsruhe as well as the CEO & Artistic Director of Comic Opera Helsinki, a new opera house in Finland.
She was a jury member at the Theater Dortmund’s Academy for Theatre and Digitality, a globally unique pilot project for digital innovation, artistic research, and technology-oriented training and further education for all areas of the performing arts in 2020-2023.
In 2019 she was a finalist candidate for the position of Directrice Générale at Opéra de Lyon and as well in 2022 Opéra national de Bordeaux for the same position.
As the tradition in the family, she studied many languages early on, such as English, German, French, and also some Italian and Russian. The years in Germany have molded her thinking and ways of working in relation to opera. With these language skills she has worked in Finland, Germany, England, Sweden and Russia since 2006.