February 2009

The premiere of the new piece for two clarinets and six instruments will by given by the Zelinsky-Smeyers clarinet duo and the Caput Ensemble at the WDR in Cologne on Saturday February 28.  The piece is entitled Orgoras Speaks. The programme also features Trust Me for viola, clarinet and piano.  The concert will be broadcast live.

Now working on a rather big piece for choir (Hljómeyki vocal ensemble of Reykjavík) to be premiered this summer in Skálholt, Southern Iceland, as part of the annual Skálholt Festival where I feature as composer in residence this year.

The flute solo Communion had two almost simultaneous North-American premieres on January 24 and 28.  Mark McGregor played it in Vancouver on the former date and Eric Lamb at Eastern Michigan University on the latter (his New York performance in December had to be cancelled).

The Reykjavík Chamber Ensemble with Rúnar Óskarsson, basset-clarinet, performed Is Anybody There? for clarinet and strings on February 8 as part of the Dark Music Days festival.  Bernhard Wilkinson conducted this wonderful interpretation.

Susanne Kessel gave yet another performance of ...ma la melodia at the Icelandic Embassy in Berlin on  February 18, along with other Icelandic pieces from her CD Iceland.