BBC Symphony Orchestra & Chorus 2025-26 Barbican Season Total Immersion: Icelandic Chill - Soundworlds

Icelandic composers are creating sounds like no-one has ever heard, while record labels such as Reykjavík’s Bedroom Community channel a very Icelandic vibe, and take it global. From Bára Gísladóttir genre-bending bass concerto Hringla (performed by the composer) to the poetic soundscapes of Daníel Bjarnason, everything in this concert is new to the UK.

The atmospheric soundworlds of Ólafur Arnalds and Valgeir Sigurðsson are familiar from TV and movies, but in Iceland, everyone stands on shifting ground. Two major new works take us into the heart of the modern Icelandic imagination: stunning, rarely-seen outtakes from the movie Dreamland merge with Sigurðsson’s music to evoke a natural world as fragile as it is beautiful.