Miles Mykkanen

A further significant cast change was the role of the groom, Tuomas, in San Francisco taken by Michigan tenor Miles Mykkanen. Of beautiful, clear voice and vibrant presence he was the exuberant lover at his wedding, the insecure son arguing with his father, and finally the conflicted accomplice to the shooter who cowardly fled the scene of the shooting. In the end he was ruined, but freed from the innocence he had feigned.
Opera Today, Michael Milenski
The Steersman is always one to watch, and Miles Mykkanen was one of the sweetest and most clarion-voiced I’ve heard in some time, with effortless ascents and a creamy top. This was a reminder that this music is completely steeped in bel canto traditions.
Opera Wire, Benjamin Poore
Finnish-American tenor Miles Mykkanen, with a blossoming international career, sang “Comfort ye” with operatic drama and charisma. On the line, “The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness,” he almost shrieked “wilderness” — a wonderfully raw and utterly theatrical delivery. Later in his lone aria — the tenor gets just one in this abbreviated version — Mykkanen’s rapid runs were beautifully controlled, his high notes clear and almost boyishly charming.
ArtsAtl.com, Piere Ruhe
As Albert, tenor Miles Mykkanen displayed a lovely lyric voice with an appealing honeyed sweetness in the timbre, which he employed with intelligence and humor.
Opera News, Mark Thomas Ketterson
Tenor Miles Mykkanen produced a larger than life portrait of the Nutrice and Arnalta, hamming up the comedy for all it was worth, for which he showed a definite talent. The fact he is playing female roles, and at one point disguises himself as as man allowed for plenty of deliberate confusion over gender, and the seduction scene with Valletto was very amusing. He has naturally loud voice and would have no problem singing in large venues. For the Théâtre du Jeu de Paume, however, he was too loud, occasionally drowning out the orchestra. Apart from this fact, he sang well, characterizing his voice very skillfully. He was also parted as Familgliare 1.
Opera Wire, Alan Neilson
Les rôles que concocte Miles Mykkanen (Arnalta, la Nourrice, Famigliare I) font du chanteur et de ses personnages, bouffes avant l’heure, la clé de voûte du drame. Ses rôles, tous travestis, font appel à la mâle et robuste assurance de son émission, à l’ambre rocaille de son timbre, ainsi qu’à la diversité virtuose de ses registres d’expression.
Olyrix, Florence Lethurgez
Miles Mykkanen’s brilliantly projected tenor vivified the role of Brighella.
Opera News, Fred Cohn
Wadsworth chooses to elevate the figure of the Simpleton—a character who as scripted appears in one scene in the opera—to be Godunov’s virtual co-protagonist here, displacing the Russian people in that role. Spinning like a top and scattering balletic anguish, the Simpleton appears continually, siphoning focus. The fine American tenor Miles Mykkanen gave it his all and sang very beautifully.
Opera News, David Shengold
It was very easy to lose oneself in Miles Mykkanen’s voice: even at his loudest he sang with a ravishing yet tender tone, as if caressing each note with his voice. Lensky’s aria from Eugene Onegin was the perfect choice for Mykkanen, showcasing his sugar-plum pianissimo and soaring head voice.
His performance of “Je crois entendre encore” from Les Pêcheurs de Perles was the musical highlight of the program, Mykkanen bringing out a velvety glow even in Bizet’s more declamatory phrases. The tenor’s smoothness and control (especially evident in his finely-spun high register) gave a sense of time-stopping weightlessness to Bizet’s sweeping musical gestures.
Parterre.com, Callum John Blackmore
Miles Mykkanen was a knockout as Lensky. The Russian language brought out a squillante quality in his tenor, thrilling to hear in the confines of the Willson Theater. The lyric intensity of his singing made each moment count, and the duel-scene aria was a stretch of sheer vocal gold.
Opera News, Fred Cohn
Tenor Miles Mykkanen stood out for his ardent, irascible performance as Nikolaus Sprink, the German soldier voicing his disillusion with the overlords who make war happen.
Minnesota Star Tribune, Terry Blain
Discography
The career of exuberant young Finnish-American tenor Miles Mykkanen was launched with a national win of the Metropolitan Opera Laffont Competition in 2019. He has since impressed with a series of important debuts on the world’s major stages, including the Metropolitan Opera, Bayerische Staatsoper, Canadian Opera Company, and Royal Opera House Covent Garden, where The i declared his performance “the most beautiful singing of the evening” and Opera Magazine dubbed it “so striking and brilliant” that “he managed to turn the Steersman into a principal character.”
Mykkanen has quickly become the go-to tenor for roles requiring a deft balance of power, lyricism, and dramatic acuity, including a new Barrie Kosky production of Die Fledermaus and Philip Venables’ world premiere We Are The Lucky Ones, both at Dutch National Opera, a new Ted Huffman production of L’incoronazione di Poppea at Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, and the North American premiere of Kaija Saariaho’s Innocence at San Francisco Opera. Additional appearances include Die tote Stadt (Bayerische Staatsoper), Falstaff (Staatsoper Hamburg), Candide (Opéra de Lausanne, Ravinia, Tanglewood), Silent Night (Minnesota Opera), A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Opera Philadelphia), and Boris Godunov, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Ariadne auf Naxos, and Wozzeck, all at the Met. His Albert Herring at Chicago Opera Theater was praised by Opera News for “an appealing honeyed sweetness which he employed with intelligence and humor.”
Mykkanen has performed under the baton of Franz Welser-Möst (Ariadne auf Naxos with Cleveland Orchestra), Krzysztof Urbański (Carmina Burana with Atlanta Symphony Orchestra), Manfred Honeck (Bruckner’s Te Deum with Pittsburgh Symphony), and Leonard Slatkin (West Side Story with New York Philharmonic and Mohammed Fairouz’sAnother Time with Detroit Symphony). His in-demand interpretations of Handel’s Messiah have taken him to the symphonies of Atlanta, Kansas City, Indianapolis, and New Jersey, as well as the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center. This season, he debuts with Phoenix Symphony in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with Music Director Tito Muñoz amidst returns to the Cleveland Orchestra for staged performances of Jenůfa with Welser-Möst and Atlanta Symphony Orchestra for Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis with Music Director Nathalie Stutzmann.
Mykkanen’s compelling blend of charisma and honesty has engaged audiences in cabaret performances at Joe’s Pub, Neue Galerie’s Cabaret at Café Sabarsky, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where he curated Lavender Nights, a live installation of queer anthems. He honed his artistic flexibility in explorations of chamber music and art song with legendary musicians like Mitsuko Uchida, Malcolm Martineau, Roger Vignoles, and Steven Blier at the Marlboro Music Festival, New York Festival of Song, New World Symphony, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, and Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.
A proud Yooper from Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, Mykkanen leveraged his pandemic downtime to create community around the arts in his hometown of Ironwood. As founding Artistic Director of the Emberlight Festival, he has built a formidable board, raising $750,000 in a county where the annual median income is $29,000. Emberlight has now produced 119 individual events – including a film festival with entries from 83 countries, live performances of chamber music, cabarets, and plays, a photography show and public art installations, and performance infusions featuring regional artists in everything from Ojibwe basket weaving to wool waulking. More than 70% of those events have been free to attend, ensuring that the arts are accessible to everyone in the rural region.
Mykkanen is grateful for the support he has received from the Richard Tucker Foundation, Sullivan Foundation, Toulmin Foundation, YoungArts, and the Juilliard School, where he received a Novick Career Advancement Grant and the Joseph W. Polisi Award. He is a graduate of the Interlochen Arts Academy and earned his BM, MM, and Artist Diploma in Opera Studies from Juilliard under the tutelage of Cynthia Hoffmann.
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