According to Tolkki "I find the Metal Opera concept fascinating and logical to me at this point of my career. I love classical music and just like in Classical Opera, in the Metal Opera you can also create stories and have almost limitless possibilities musically".[2]
History
Foundation and The Land of New Hope (2013)
The project, including its name, was conceived by Frontiers Records's founder Serafino Perugino in 2010. He called Tolkki back then and asked if he wanted to do a metal opera like that.[3]
Tobias Sammet, German musician and mentor of Avantasia, another metal opera which had its 6th album released in March 2013, received the news of Timo Tolkki's own project with initial sarcasm, stating: "Wow, someone is extraordinarily creative here: the title, the guests, the timing... What a funny coincidence, isn't it?! But there have been thousands of Metal Operas, especially after Avantasia. Such is business...".[5] However, he later stated: "There are a lot of metal operas out there, and I have to deal with that. If something is very successful or even not successful then other people may feel inspired by it. It's Timo Tolkki (laughs) what can I say, he's a great guy and he does what he does. I wish him the best of luck."[6]
When asked about if he was aware that this project would be compared to Avantasia, Timo replied that "Nobody owns a franchise to 'metal operas' which is not really an operatic format because it doesn't have any real dialogue between the singers."[7]
Angels of the Apocalypse (2014)
In October 2013 Timo launched a news website for the project in which he announced the sequel to The Land of New Hope, which was provisionally titled Avalon II.[8] The cast of guest musicians will be revealed one by one.[8]Simone Simons of Epica fame is the first confirmed singer.[9]Floor Jansen will play the leading role.[10] It was also announced that Timo's former bandmates in Stratovarius, drummer Tuomo Lassila and keyboardist Antti Ikonen will play on this album.[11][12]
A European tour was planned for May 2014, coinciding with the release of the album.[10]
Return to Eden (2019), The Enigma Birth (2021) and dissolution
In early 2019, Timo Tolkki announced the third Avalon album and remaining part of the Avalon trilogy, Return to Eden, with the main working song, "Promises".[14][15]
The fourth Avalon studio album, The Enigma Birth was released on 18 June 2021, extending the Avalon conceptual saga.[16] Shortly after the album's release, Timo Tolkki announced the end of the Avalon project after a dispute with Frontiers Records.