This recording features the twelve-tone opera Kaivos (The Mine) by Einojuhani Rautavaara who also wrote the libretto (sung in Finnish). The opera in three acts tells the story of an uprising by mine workers somewhere in Europe at the end of the 1950s.

Rautavaara wrote this, his first opera, from 1957-62 and today considers it, "perhaps the best opera I have ever written, a real thriller whose underlying theme - that a human being defines himself through his choices - is nevertheless universal."

This CD release represents a real highlight in the work's exceptional history: the opera's underlying thematic allusions to the 1956 Hungarian uprising impeded a staged performance in Finland, a neighboring country of the then Soviet Union. Instead, a TV production was broadcast in 1963, making it the first Finnish Television opera. The present recording was made in connection with the premier live concert performance of the opera in Tampere (Finland) in September 2010, featuring the same cast.