Amberian Dawn is a symphonic power metal band that formed in 2006 in Finland. Their music combines melodic, dramatic and powerful metal with female vocals. The band currently consists of Päivi "Capri" Virkkunen (vocals), Tuomas Seppälä (keyboards, guitar), Kimmo Korhonen (guitar), Emil Pohjalainen (guitar), Jukka Koskinen (bass) and Joonas Pykälä-aho (drums).
Amberian Dawn is musically lead by keyboardist/guitarist Tuomas Seppälä, who exclusively composes all music for AD.
All members of the band have some form of extended history with music and have played in many different bands. Tuomas Seppälä, Heikki Saari(drums), Peter James Goodman (vocals), and Tommi Kuri played in a band called Virtuocity. As Virtuocity disbanded, they started working on songs composed by Tuomas. He started playing guitar, which he mastered as well as playing keyboards. Sampo Seppälä (guitars) and Tom Sagar (keyboards) joined to establish Atheme One.
It was in the summer of 2006 that Tuomas and Tommi decided to start looking for a female classical singer. Tuomas had composed dozens of songs that were not suitable for the voice of Atheme One's vocalist, Peter James Goodman. They didn't want to waste the songs, so they began searching for suitable singer.
After a few weeks search, almost at the same time, they found the same advertisement - a classical soprano singer Heidi Parviainen (from the band Iconofear). They listened to her sample and decided to organize a demo session. They were pleased with the demo and thought that Heidi would be a perfect match and they liked the fact that Heidi can write lyrics too.
Their first studio session was in fall 2006 in which they recorded two songs (River of Tuoni and Evil Inside Me) at the Rockstar Productions studio in Hyvinkää, Finland. Soon after, Heikki Saari moved to a band called Norther, being replaced by Joonas Pykälä-Aho (from the band Thaurorod and Lathspell).
After a while Sampo Seppälä decided to leave the band due to personal reasons. On August 1, 2007 the band introduced Kasperi Heikkinen (previously in Guardians of Mankind, Merging Flare, and Iconofear) as the new guitarist.
Amberian Dawn signed a record deal with Finnish label KHY Suomen Musiikki. Their debut album, River of Tuoni, was released in Finland on January 30, 2008 and hit the charts right after release in Finland.
In the summer and Autumn of 2008, they were the main support for Epica's European tour. In late 2008, they recorded their second album The Clouds of Northland Thunder which was released in June of 2009.
Third album End of Eden was released in October 2010 on Spinefarm Records
Their fourth album Circus Black was released in February 2012.
In late 2012, the band lost three members, vocalist Heidi Parviainen, drummer Heikki Saari and guitarist Kasperi Heikkinen. Parviainen made an announcement on Facebook, saying that "Early this year we noticed that we had reached the point where we didn't have much to offer to each other any more, and my own ambitions and Amberian Dawn's goals weren't coinciding any longer." Former members Joonas Pykälä-aho (drums) and Emil "Emppu" Pohjalainen (guitar) were announced to be rejoining to replace the two departing instrumentalists.
On December 21, 2012, the new singer was revealed to be Päivi "Capri" Virkkunen, and that she would participate in the creation of a compilation album. In the announcement, Tuomas Seppälä said: "Finding Capri and getting her to join AD is like a big dream coming true to me. Capri shares the same taste in music as I and that's why is obvious that our new partnership is like “match made in heaven”. She really makes my compositions to shine like never before and I'm so impressed about her every way. I'm as excited as back then, when I found our original singer Heidi. Now my main focus is to make the whole world to hear about Capri and start composing new songs for her. But first, we're all concentrating on recording this compilation album with Capri and then I'll start working with new material for the new studio album".
Their compliation album "Re-Evolution" was released on June 14, 2013 (Finland) and June 17, 2013 (Europe, USA, Japan, Asia & Australia). It features songs previously sung by Heidi Parviainen, but interpreted by Capri.
Official site: http://www.amberiandawn.com
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