[#80] February 1, 2021
2013 | Brass and percussion | Grade 5 | 10’ – 15’ | Chamber music, contemporary
Into - Second Self, by Icelandic composer Anna Thorvaldsdottir is our Composition of the Week.
Into - Second Self was written in 2013, using the rather unusual instrumentation of 4 horns, 3 trombones and 4 percussionists.
Thorvaldsdottir’s music is determined by the vastness and cool grace of the Icelandic landscape. Her “seemingly boundless textural imagination” and “striking” sound world has made her “one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary music”.
Her music is composed as much by sounds and nuances as by harmonies and lyrical material. It is written as an ecosystem of sounds, where materials continuously grow in and out of each other, often inspired in an important way by nature and its many qualities, in particular structural ones, like proportion and flow.
Anna Thorvaldsdottir holds a PhD (2011) from the University of California in San Diego. She is currently based in the London area and its Composer-in-Residence at the Iceland Symphony Orchestra.
Into - Second Self has a duration of 13 minutes and it is available through Wise Music Classical.
More info on Anna Thorvaldsdottir: