The idea of Nightwish is "born" in July 1996, at midnight, when Tuomas was spending a night with friends around a fire. The first three tracks, which are states of mind of acoustic music, were recorded between October and December 1996. At that time, the group had three members: Tuomas, Tarja and Emppu.
We wanted to try what the music sounds as if drums were added (Jukka came to Banda), and an electric guitar was used in place of a horn. After a couple of weeks of training that went to study in April 1997. At that time we had seven songs that can be found on a limited edition album Angels Fall First.
In May 1997 Nightwish signed a contract with Spinefarm for two records. In August went to Nightwish studio and recorded four new songs. Before the release of Angels Fall First, a single called The Carpenter was released at its best, and that was the number eight on individual graph official in Finland. Angels first fall was released in early November and was at its best number 31 on the table in Finland official album.
Nightwish played their first concert in Kitee December 31, 1997. After Nightwish played only seven concerts in the following winter because Jukka and Emppu were Tarja and the army was busy with his studies. Nightwish Spinefarm and extended the contract to include three entries instead of two.
In April 1998 shooting of the first video, The Carpenter began. It was ready in early May and was held in Jyrki. Tuomas and Tarja were also interviewed to show that (this happened at the end of May). In the summer following bassist Sami V? Nsk? United Group. During the summer songs for the new disc were tested and the group went to study at the beginning of August. The recordings were completed at the end of October. On 13 November, Nightwish played a concert in Kitee, including a video for the Sacrament of Wilderness was shot. A single song, which was released on November 26 and the new record called Oceanborn was released on December 7.
Everyone was surprised by the success of Oceanborn. It went up to fifth place for the official Finnish album chart and the single Sacrament of Wilderness was the number one single on the chart for weeks. In winter 1999 Nightwish played a lot of concerts all across the country for three months and has also played in the graph shows the List program. In spring Oceanborn was released outside of Finland. In May, the group has begun to play concerts again and tour the country for two and a half months playing in almost all the big rock festival. At the same time, the individual Sleeping Sun was recorded, which was written for the eclipse in Germany. In August the single was released in Germany and that includes songs Walking in the Air, Swanheart and Angels Fall First. In Germany alone, the single sold 15000 copies in a month. In August Nightwish learned that Oceanborn and Sacrament of Wilderness had sold gold. At the same time, it was confirmed that Nightwish would make a European tour of 26 concerts with a German group called Rage.
In early 2000 the band re-entered the studio to the recording of our third album. A welcome interruption to study repetitive work came when we took part in the Finnish qualification for the Eurovision Song Contest with the song Sleepwalker. Nightwish eliminated in the first qualifying round, but the final position despite the second was an overwhelming victory in the public televoting.
The new album, Wishmaster was released in the month of May and Wishmaster Tour started from Kitee, the birthplace of the band. After the show the group has received gold records for the album Oceanborn and individual Sacrament of Wilderness, walking in Air and Sleeping Sun. Wishmaster went straight to number 1 on the Finnish album charts and suspend the pole position for three weeks. In those three weeks has also reached the gold mark.
