Anna Thorvaldsdottir

Iceland

A sound colorist who creates emotional spaces for listener and performer to crawl into and live for a while; her music evokes great landscapes that seem also to capture a kind of longing for their beauty and solitude.  Anna will respond to Buxtehude's second cantata, TO THE KNEES, premiering Friday night June 24.  She will collaborate with poet Gudrun Eva Minervudottir to create a new libretto (learn more about Gudrun here ...and about her work here).

Anna Thorvaldsdottir (Iceland) frequently works with large sonic structures that tend to reveal the presence of a vast variety of sustained sound materials, reflecting her sense of imaginative listening to landscapes and nature. Her music tends to portray a flowing world of sounds with an enigmatic lyrical atmosphere. Anna’s music has been featured at several major music festivals such as ISCM World Music Days, Nordic Music Days, Ultima Festival, Beijing Modern Music Festival and the Composer Portraits Series at NYC's Miller Theatre. Her works have been nominated and awarded on many occasions. Her chamber orchestra piece Hrim was awarded Composition of the Year at the Icelandic Music Awards 2011, as well as the International Music Prize for Excellence in Composition 2011. At the Icelandic Music Awards 2012, Anna was awarded Composer of the Year and her debut album Rhízōma was awarded Classical/Contemporary Album of the Year. Anna is the recipient of the prestige Nordic Council Music Prize 2012 for her work Dreaming. Anna’s debut portrait album - Rhízōma - was released in October 2011 through Innova Recordings. The album was very well received and, in addition to being selected Classical/Contemporary Album of the Year at the Icelandic Music Awards 2012, the album also appeared on a number of “Best of 2011” lists, e.g. at TimeOut New York and TimeOut Chicago.

To learn more about Anna, visit her website.

Anna's Libretto

Knees of Jesus

Seven Responses

by Gudrun Eva Minervudottir

I fall to my knees

I fall

I fall

I fall

to my knees and ask

forgiveness for

lazy thoughts,

unseemly hunger

and

the beautiful, wild stampede of my fear

I fall to my knees

I fall

I fall

I fall

to my knees and into

the dark haze

of the purple, innocent sky

I fall deep into the sky and beg

for clarity,

true satisfaction

and union of the soul

I give myself up

I give

I give up

I fall to my knees

I fall

I fall

I fall

to my knees and worship

the eternal music