Tarja Soile Susanna Turunen Cabuli, born 17 August 1977, known professionally as  Tarja Turunen or simply  Tarja, is a Finnish heavy metal singer songwriter. She is a lyric soprano and has a vocal range of three octaves. Turunen studied singing at  Sibelius Academy and  Hochschule für Musik Karlsruhe. She is a professional classical lied singer, and the former lead vocalist of the Finnish symphonic metal band  Nightwish, which she founded with  Tuomas Holopainen and  Emppu Vuorinen in 1996.