Laila Kinnunen

A Finnish pop singer who reached the height of her fame in the late 1950s and early 1960s, Laila Kinnunen carried Finland’s flag at the 1961 Eurovision Song Contest performing “Valoa Ikkunassa.” Laura Kinnunen entered the world on November 8, 1939, in Vantaa, Finland, and spent her childhood in Sweden after fleeing World War II as a refugee. Her recording career opened in the closing years of the 1950s on the domestic Scandia imprint, where one of her first releases was the 1959 Finnish rendering of “Cow Cow Boogie.” Chosen to represent her homeland at Eurovision’s 1961 edition, she delivered “Valoa Ikkunassa,” marking Finland’s inaugural appearance in the contest. Numerous singles followed in the form of Finnish-language adaptations of contemporary international successes, among them “Fever” issued as “Kuume,” “The Girl from Ipanema” as “Ipaneman Tyttö,” “From Russia with Love” as “Idän Ja Lännen Tiet,” and “I Can't Stop Loving You” as “Jag Ger Dig Kärleken.” Kinnunen passed away on October 26, 2000; afterward several career-spanning collections appeared, including Kaikki Kauneimmat (2000), Nostalgia (2007), Tähtisarja: 30 Suosikkia (2008), and the two-disc set A la Laila (2009), which climbed into the Finnish albums chart’s Top Ten.