ATMOSPHERIQUES Vol. I Iceland Symphony Orchestra & Daníel Bjarnason

• Anna Thorvaldsdottir (b. 1977): CATAMORPHOSIS:
• 1 Thorvaldsdottir: CATAMORPHOSIS 21:18
• Missy Mazzoli (b. 1980): Sinfonia (for Orbiting Spheres):
• 2 Mazzoli: Sinfonia (for Orbiting Spheres) 09:12
• Daníel Bjarnason (b. 1979): From Space I Saw Earth:
• 3 Bjarnason: From Space I Saw Earth 13:06
• María Huld Markan Sigfúsdóttir (b. 1980): Clockworking for Orchestra:
• 4 Sigfúsdóttir: Clockworking for Orchestra 09:03
• Bára Gísladóttir (b. 1989): ÓS:
• 5 Gísladóttir: ÓS 06:14
• Total Runtime 58:53

Info for ATMOSPHERIQUES Vol. I

At the risk of getting doxxed by my musician colleagues, I’m going to divulge a dark truth about classical music: it’s never as captivating or molecule-altering for anyone as it is for us on stage.

Which is why I often find classical records, especially those of the orchestral persuasion, so underwhelming. So not…immediate. Which is why I am approaching zealot status in my admiration for Sono Luminus and the way in which it submerges listeners within reach of the Atlantis that is the on-stage experience. Which is why, save for live performance, the often inimitable new-music originating in, or in proximity to, Iceland (homeland to an unreasonable percentage of the composers living rent-free in my headphones for more than a decade) has found its most ardent advocate and most clarion amplifier in Winchester, Virginia. Certainly its exceptional national orchestra has.

Despite a bewildering insistence by journalists to characterize music written by those with Icelandic surnames as a monolith, the entries on this tracklist are as singular as hand blown glass. The inclusion of American sonic clairvoyant Missy Mazzoli is a helpful geographic foil here, but there is one element fusing all of these inventions: Your person is about to feel minuscule or massive, by contrast to – or motivated by – these sounds.

Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s music is often intimidatingly cyclopean, and Catamorphosis at times mimics the cosmic indifference of Lovecraft-ian deities, but it simultaneously introduces an iridescent hope I have not encountered before in her music. Mazzoli’s Sinfonia (for Orbiting Spheres) catapults us from one end of a pulsing solar system to the other while Daníel Bjarnason’s From Space I Saw Earth improbably stretches perspective from earth to the moon and back, seeming somehow both terrestrial and paranormal within a single phrase. Maria Huld Markan Sigfúsdóttir’s Clockworking for Orchestra bridges a similar expanse, coexisting within the measurable realm of time-keeping…and the immeasurable realm of what occurs as the seconds tick by. Is Bára Gísladóttir’s ÓS gasping in air, or desperately exhaling? Whatever your observation, and as with every waypoint on this illusory itinerary, the answer is likely: both. (Doyle Armbrust)

Iceland Symphony Orchestra
Daniel Bjarnason, conductor

Daníel Bjarnason
Icelandic conductor and composer Daníel Bjarnason is currently artist in residence with the Iceland Symphony Orchestra. From season 16/17, Daniel will be composer in residence at the Muziekgebouw Frits Philips Eindhoven. A co-curator of the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Reykjavik Festival, Daniel will be featured as both a conductor and composer in Los Angeles in April 2017.

Recent and upcoming commissions include works for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, Rambert Dance Company, Britten Sinfonia, Jennifer Koh, So Percussion, Calefax and the Calder Quartet. Daníel is writing his first opera for the Danish National Opera in Aarhus and will be premiered in August 2017 as part of the Aarhus – Culture Capital of Europe celebrations. Based on the Susanne Bier film Brothers, the opera will be directed by Kasper Holten, and Steffen Aarfing will create the stage design. The librettist is Kerstin Perski.

Daníel Bjarnason’s music has been described as “coming eerily close to defining classical music’s undefinable brave new world” (Time Out New York), under conductors such as Gustavo Dudamel, John Adams James Conlon, André de Ridder, Louis Langree and Ilan Volkov in venues such as Walt Disney Concert Hall, Lincoln Center, Harpa and the Barbican. Daníel’s versatility has also led to collaborations with a broad array of musicians outside the classical field including Sigur Rós, Brian Eno, Efterklang and Ben Frost.

Conducting engagements include appearances with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester, Iceland Symphony Orchestra, London Sinfonietta, Ulster Orchestra, Sinfonietta Cracovia, and The Icelandic Opera.

Bjarnason’s work has been recognised on numerous occasions at the the Icelandic Music Awards. This year with the Iceland Symphony Orchestra and Iceland Opera, he received the award for Best Performer for their performance of Peter Grimes. Previously he won Best Composer/Best Composition in 2010 for Processions and Composer of the Year, 2013 for his works The Isle Is Full of Noises and Over Light Earth. Also in 2013, he and Ben Frost won the Edda Award for best soundtrack for their score to film The Deep, directed by Baltasar Kormákur.

After studying piano, composition and conducting in Reykjavík, Daníel Bjarnason pursued further studies in orchestral conducting at University of Music Freiburg. Daniel is a member of Bedroom Community, the Icelandic record label and close-knit collective comprising nine like-minded, yet diverse musicians from different corners of the globe. Daníel Bjarnason is published by Peters Edition.

Booklet for ATMOSPHERIQUES Vol. I