Composer and vocalist Tobias Sammet is one of Germany’s biggest internationally acclaimed artists in recent music history. He has sold more than 3 million discs worldwide, and has played more than 600 concerts in almost 40 countries in Asia, North America, Central America, South America, Australia and Europe.

Tobias first emerged as the singer and songwriter of Edguy, the band he helped form in 1992. In 1999 he founded his side project Tobias Sammet’s Avantasia, an all-star rock opera that would allow him to collaborate with superstars such as Alice Cooper, Klaus Meine and Rudolf Schenker (Scorpions), plus members of other legendary bands such as Kiss, Mr. Big, Magnum, Helloween, Uriah Heep and Rainbow.

All of his recent albums have entered the Top Ten charts in countries all over the world, and his latest Avantasia release, ‘The Flying Opera: Around The World In 20 Days’, went straight to Number 1 in Germany, Sweden and Austria.

In 2011 Tobias announced the end of the project as TV cameras shot footage for a live broadcast of Avantasia’s headlining performance at the prestigious Wacken Open Air Festival. However, Tobias is more than able to explain this unexpected comeback of Avantasia: “During our summer tour in 2008 we played to more than half a million fans worldwide. We had fought our way into the upper regions of the charts with hard work, despite the fact we didn’t have major radio support. Even before that Wacken performance I knew there wasn’t much headroom left and that I should focus on something new to spare me the descent. But it was impossible to quit. I am an artist; I had ideas and felt that I wanted to keep going as long as I saw challenging targets and as long as I could hit new goals. So I hired an orchestra and tried to push the dreamy and fairytale-ish atmosphere to the limit and beyond. I wanted to create a real grown-up rock opera, but foremost appealing to real rockers. Something between Richard Wagner, Meat Loaf, Queen and a freight-train at high speed!”

‘The Mystery Of Time’s all-star cast includes Eric Martin (Mr. Big), Joe Lynn Turner (ex-Rainbow, Deep Purple), Biff Byford (Saxon), Michael Kiske (ex-Helloween, Unisonic), Bob Catley (Magnum), Ronnie Atkins (Pretty Maids), Sascha Paeth (ex- Heavens Gate), Bruce Kulick (ex-Kiss, ex-Meat Loaf), Arjen Lucassen (ex-Vengeance, Ayreon), and features artwork by the legendary Rodney Matthews (Magnum, Thin Lizzy, Asia).