As the vocalist for Esa Pethman's quartet and Hazy Osterwald's sextet in the early 1960s, Carola made fame in Finland and Sweden, and toured Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Switzerland.

In late 1960s and early 1970s, she performed in nine languages and a wide variety of styles, including chanson, schlager, Latin, rock'n'roll, and soul.

As the lead singer of Esa Pethman's quartet, Carola gained fame in Sweden, Poland and Czechoslovakia in 1963 and released her first track in Finland.

:[1] the Jewish folk song "Hava Nagila", published by the RCA as the B-side of Laila Halme's version of "Telstar".

[3] Returning to Finland in 1965, Carola released a single in German, "Warum Willst Du Das Alles Vergessen" and also performed with a backup band, The Boys, who mostly recorded cover versions of songs in the English language, including The Rolling Stones' "The Last Time" and Skeeter Davis' "The End of the World".

As the vocalist of the Heikki Sarmanto Trio, she gave a number of concerts in Finland and recorded a session in the studios of Yle on 5 June 1966.

The tongue-in-cheek choreography by Heikki Värtsi included girl group dancing and Carola whipping a man in a cave.

[9][10] Her rhythm & blues covers continued with the television videos of Elaine Brown's "Seize the Time" and "The End of Silence" (in Finnish as "Sanaton hiljaisuus").

[10] In the mid-1970s, tired of living constantly in the public eye, Carola retired from the music industry[3] and concentrated on work in her husband Georg Liemola's vegetable wholesale company.

In 1987, Carola gave an exclusive concert with the UMO Jazz Orchestra and two years later one with pianist Iiro Rantala.

[13][14] Using her international experience, Carola performed in nine languages, including Finnish, Swedish, German, French, Italian, English, and Spanish.

[11] In 1998, Carola's song "Armonaikaa" was used as the closing credits theme of the Prix Europa Special winning film Hardly a Butterfly.

[13] A biographical play Kielletyt leikit (Forbidden Games), named after the title of the singer's version of the Spanish tune "Romance" and based on Carola's life, ran for a month in the Frenckell theatre of Tampere in 2009.