Finnish soprano Mari Palo pursued her vocal studies at the Keski-Pohjanmaa Conservatory and at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, where she received her MA with distinction. Besides her teachers Sirkka Haavisto, Marjut Hannula and presently Elizabeth Werres, she has studied lied with Elizabeth Schwarzkopf, Hartmut Höll, Mitsuko Shirai and Ilmo Ranta.

Mari Palo’s quite unusual repertoire includes such parts as Tytti/The Canine Kaleva  (Kuusisto) at the Savonlinna Opera Festival, Zaida in Andre Campra's L'Europe Galante, the title role in Vladislav Uspenski's musical Anna Karenina and many contemporary Finnish operas by such composers as Juha Koskinen, Kimmo Lintinen and Jukka Linkola.

A regular guest with the Finnish National Opera in Helsinki since 1999, she has appeared as Pamina/the Magic Flute, Micaela/Carmen, Refka/Adriana Mater (Saariaho), and Vera/Daddy’s girl (Kortekangas), among others.  Further she performed: Musetta/La Bohème at the Norske Opera in Oslo and Leipzig, the Hercules-Opera at the Helsinki Festival 2006,  as well as Violetta/La Traviata in Kuopio, Gräfin Mariza in Tampere (2007) and the part of Venla in Markus Fagerrud’s The seven Dog Brothers at the Opera Festival in Savonlinna (2008).
In the season 2010/11 Ms.Palo has again been heard at the Finnish National Opera as Marian in Linkola´s new opera Robin Hood as well as Vera/Isän tyttö and as Musetta/La Boheme.

Mari Palo is an active and versatile concert soloist. She has performed with most Finnish orchestras under conductors such as Esa-Pekka Salonen, Leif Segerstam, Juha Kangas and Joseph Swensen. She has also given recitals in Finland and abroad. In summer 2004 Mari Palo was one of the soloists in the world premiere and recording of Barabbas’ Dialogues by Aulis Sallinen. In 2008 she performed Beethoven’s 9^th Symphony at the Helsinki Festival.