Composer Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s 2025-2026 Season Highlights
Photo by Anna Maggy. High resolution photos available here.
Composer Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s 2025-2026 Season Highlights
2025-2026 Composer-in-Residence with the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra
Iceland Symphony Orchestra European Tour Featuring ARCHORA
Conducted by Eva Ollikainen
Continued Country and Local Premieres of Major Orchestral Works
Before we fall, METACOSMOS, AIŌN, CATAMORPHOSIS, ARCHORA
“[Thorvaldsdottir] has carved her own corner in contemporary music by creating symphonic works of sustained brilliance.” – The Times
Schedule: www.annathorvalds.com/performances
Composer Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s “seemingly boundless textural imagination” (The New York Times) and striking sound world has made her “one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary music” (NPR). 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’s 2025-2026 season (September 2025 to June 2026) features performances of her music in more than 13 countries including Australia, Canada, Denmark, England, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Spain, Switzerland, and the United States. This season, Thorvaldsdottir’s works will be performed by 16 orchestras in 11 countries, with several of them – including the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Iceland Symphony Orchestra – performing multiple works. Her current schedule is available on her website and will be updated with additional performances throughout the year.
Following her appointment as the Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich’s Creative Chair last season, Thorvaldsdottir has been appointed Composer-in-Residence with the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra (HPO) for the 2025-2026 season. From September 2025 to June 2026, the orchestra presents a number of her large orchestral pieces. The season began on 5 September with the Finnish premiere of Thorvaldsdottir’s Aeriality (2010) conducted by HPO Chief Conductor and Artistic Director Jukka-Pekka Saraste. On 16 January 2026, the HPO will give the Finnish premiere of Thorvaldsdottir’s cello concerto, Before we fall, which the orchestra co-commissioned. Johannes Moser will be the cello soloist, and Sarasate will lead the performance. On 4-5 February, the HPO, conducted by Pekka Kuusisto, will perform CATAMORPHOSIS and on 27 February 2026, the HPO conducted by Eva Ollikainen performs Thorvaldsdottir’s AIŌN paired with Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring.
Of her role with the HPO, Anna Thorvaldsdottir says, “It is such a pleasure to be Composer-in-Residence with the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra and to be a part of the orchestra’s devotion to bringing the audience a carefully curated combination of new and recent music along with the older repertoire. Writing for the orchestra is a deep passion of mine, organically reflecting how I hear music and work with combinations of materials.”
Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s "volcanic" (The Times) cello concerto Before we fall (2025) is her latest large-scale orchestral work. Written for cellist Johannes Moser, the concerto is co-commissioned by the San Francisco Symphony, BBC Proms, Iceland Symphony Orchestra, Helsinki Philharmonic, and Odense Symphony Orchestra. Of its world premiere by the San Francisco Symphony led by Dalia Stasevska in May 2025, the San Francisco Chronicle raved, “Thorvaldsdottir’s new cello concerto, Before We Fall, is a banger, sonically and intellectually. . . Moser played throughout with both thrilling splendor and fierce intimacy. . .Thorvaldsdottir’s sound world, both delicate and massive, is like no other. . . in [Dalia] Stasevska’s hands, [it] induced a trancelike sense of being outside of time.” The UK premiere at the BBC Proms by the BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Ollikainen was similarly praised, with The Guardian reporting that “the concerto has an elemental, immersive quality, its symphonic textures seeming at times to breath as if a living organism.”
Anna’s other large orchestral works Dreaming (2008), Aeriality (2010), METACOSMOS (2017), AIŌN (2018), CATAMORPHOSIS (2020), and ARCHORA (2022) continue to receive country and local premieres as well as repeat performances throughout the world:
ARCHORA will have at least nineteen performances this season, with its premiere in The Netherlands performed by the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra conducted by Klaus Mäkelä, at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam (17-18 September). The BBC Symphony Orchestra will perform ARCHORA, conducted by Dalia Stasevska, at the Barbican in London (8 October); the Orchestre national de Metz Grand Est, conducted by Léo Warynski, will perform at Arsenal de Metz in Metz, France (14-15 November); the Frankfurt Radio Symphony performs the piece, conducted by Tabita Berglund, at the hr-Sendesaal in Frankfurt, Germany (20-22 November); Tabitha Berglund also conducts the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra in two performances at Music Hall in Cincinnati, OH (6-7 February); and The Trondheim Symphony Orchestra will perform the work, conducted by Berglund at Olavshallen in Trondheim, Norway (5 March). The Iceland Symphony Orchestra will perform ARCHORA on its upcoming European tour conducted by Eva Ollikainen, with concerts at Palau de la Música in Barcelona, Spain (18 March); Victoria Hall in Geneva, Switzerland (20 March); Casino Bern in Bern, Switzerland (21 March); the Tonhalle Zürich in Zürich, Switzerland (22 March); in Heidelberg, Germany (24 March); and at the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg, Germany (26 March). There will be two spring performances in Switzerland performed by the Basel Sinfonietta conducted by Titus Engel, at Stadtcasino Basel in Basel (3 May) and at the Kölner Philharmonie (10 May). Of the world premiere of ARCHORA, The Guardian reported, “Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s music is about mass and density, how different planes of sounds collide and combine, and how intricately detailed textures evolve over time. Those qualities make the orchestra the obvious medium for her work, and it has largely been through her sequence of strikingly effective orchestral scores that the Iceland-born composer has become recognised as one of the most distinctive voices in European music today." ARCHORA was commissioned by the BBC Proms and co-commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Munich Philharmonic, Orchestre de Paris, Iceland Symphony Orchestra, and Klangspuren Schwaz, and was premiered in August 2022 at the BBC Proms by the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra and Ollikainen in a concert selected as among The Guardian’s Classical Highlights of 2022.
METACOSMOS will be performed at least ten times this season, with six of those performances (18, 22, 28, 30 April; and 1, 6 May) as part of choreographer Wayne McGregor’s work Untitled featuring Thorvaldsdottir’s orchestral works METACOSMOS and CATAMORPHOSIS, performed by the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, conducted by Koen Kessels. Other performances will include the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin conducted by Tabita Berglund at the Berlin Philharmonie (12 October) and Gürzenich-Orchester Köln conducted by Andrés Orozco-Estrada at the Kölner Philharmonie (10-12 May). METACOSMOS was premiered by the New York Philharmonic conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen in 2018 and in Europe by the Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Alan Gilbert in January 2019. The Boston Globe reported, “There is possibly no other composer working today who is so adept at channeling the massive forces of nature, and given a full orchestral sound palette to play with, [Thorvaldsdottir] goes wild. Writing lines that ride the knife edge of order and chaos and giving poetic but direct suggestions to the musicians, she immerses listeners in eerie, irresistible landscapes of sound.”
AIŌN was commissioned by Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra and Iceland Symphony Orchestra. Of the piece, The New York Times wrote, “Among the many wonders of Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s music – exquisitely honed timbres, an intricate play of shadow and light – perhaps the most mysterious is the way it can sound so static yet be in a state of constant (if sometimes glacial) change … This craftsmanship – a meticulous fusion of pacing, structure and coloring – is also at work in the three-movement AIŌN … Thorvaldsdottir is incapable of writing music that doesn’t immediately transfix an open-eared listener.” In addition to the HPO’s performance in February, the Aarhus Symphony Orchestra conducted by Christian Øland will perform AIŌN at Musikhuset in Aarhus, Denmark (23 April).
CATAMORPHOSIS will be performed at least nine times throughout the 2025-2026 season, as part of Thorvaldsdottir’s HPO residency (4-5 February), by the London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Kirill Karabits at Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall in London (8 April), and alongside ARCHORA with choreography by Wayne McGregor at the Royal Opera House in London (18, 22, 28, 30 April; and 1, 6 May). CATAMORPHOSIS, premiered in 2021, was commissioned by the Berlin Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and Iceland Symphony Orchestra. Of the piece The Guardian reported, “Thorvaldsdottir’s impressive new work was detailed and powerful ... Lasting around 20 minutes, it’s a single movement of restrained power, a continuum of shifting, colliding layers of sound, which are minutely detailed in the score yet manage to seem simultaneously massive and delicate as they move from dense chromaticism to moments of almost lucid tonality ... this scrupulously prepared and wonderfully performed premiere showed that it’s a piece that stands entirely on its own feet, creating an utterly convincing musical world.”
Thorvaldsdottir’s orchestral work Dreaming will be performed by the Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Matthew Halls, at Tampere Hall in Tampere, Finland (13 February). The 2008 work was premiered by the Iceland Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Bernharður Wilkins in 2010. Gramophone writes of the piece, “Dreaming is an imposing monolith that emerges from silence and recedes back into it, speaking of natural desolation, severe beauty and precarious tectonics in between.” The work was recorded and released on Rhízōma, Thorvaldsdottir’s debut portrait album, in 2011 on Innova Recordings.
In addition, Thorvaldsdottir’s large ensemble piece Aequilibria will be performed by the Australian National Academy of Music conducted by Steven Schick at the Abbotsford Convent in Abbotsford, Australia on 20 September and on 3 October by Juilliard’s Axiom ensemble, conducted by Jeffrey Milarsky in New York City. Aequilibria was commissioned by BIT20 Ensemble and recorded by International Contemporary Ensemble on Sono Luminus. The Wall Street Journal writes of the piece, “A cello drone gives way to busy, distant-sounding string and wind passages; brass writing moves between ominous, sustained tone, textured buzzing and Wagnerian heft, and a mournful alto flute line hovers briefly over a bleak ensemble texture. Shortly before the piece ends, unexpected percussion bursts and delicate piano tracery push the music toward an eerie landscape – a musical equivalent of magical realism.”
Another of Thorvalsdottir’s large ensemble pieces, Hrím, will be performed by the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic’s Ensemble 10:10 conducted by Geoffrey Paterson at the Tung Auditorium in Liverpool on 8 October. Hrím was premiered by CAPUT Ensemble at the National Gallery of Iceland in 2010. The piece is inspired by the notion of dispersion, represented as release and echoing in the sense that single elements in the music are released and spread through the ensemble in various ways throughout the process of the piece. The music is in one short movement. Of Hrím, the New York Times writes, “[Hrím] perfectly encapsulates her uncanny knack for conjuring the natural world. … Not through quaint, picturesque mimicry, but with potent evocations of elemental power, flux and potential.”
Thorvaldsdottir’s chamber ensemble music will also be performed throughout the world during the 2025-2026 season. Shades of Silence (2013) will be performed by Nordic Affect – for whom the work was written – at Mengi in Reykjavik, Iceland on 18 September and at the NOSPR Concert Hall in Katowice, Poland on 21 September. Ensemble Jackalope will also perform the work at the Leeds Conservatory on 10 February. Members of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic – pianist Junyan Chen, violinist Thelma Handy, violist Nadia Debono, and cellist Alexander Holladay – will perform the work at the Tung Auditorium in Liverpool on 3 June 2026. Additional chamber ensemble works performed this season include Ró, performed by Broken Frames Syndicate at Produktionshaus NAXOS in Frankfurt (5 September) and at Konzerthaus Blaibach in Blaibach, Germany (14 September); Entropic Arrows performed by Athelas Sinfonietta, conducted by Bjarni Frímann, at Nordatlantens Brygge in Copenhagen (25 October); Illumine performed by the Jakobstad Sinfonietta at Schaumansalen in Jakobstad, Finland (19 November); Fields performed by TM+ ensemble, conducted by Pascal Adoumbou, at Opéra de Massy in Paris (25 November); Ad Genua, performed by the Phoenix Chorale, conducted by Christopher Gabbitas, at the Scottsdale Center for Performing Arts in Scottsdale, AZ (24-25 January 2026); and Spectra performed by the Winter Quartet at Symphony Center in Chicago as part of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s chamber music series (24 March 2026). In addition to these performances, Thorvaldsdottir’s choral works continue to be performed by choirs, professional and amateur alike, all over the world.
Also this season, Thorvaldsdottir concludes her two-year period as one of ten CHANEL Next Prize winners. The biennial prize is awarded to ten international contemporary artists who are redefining their chosen discipline. Each artist embodies CHANEL’s mission to advance the new and the next and receives €100,000 in funding, allowing them to fully realize their most ambitious artistic projects. The NEXT Prize was established in 2021 as part of the CHANEL Culture Fund, CHANEL’s global initiative to accelerate the ideas that advance culture, extending the House’s century-long legacy of cultural patronage.
For Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s complete performance calendar, visit www.annathorvalds.com/performances.
All of Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s orchestral music and many of her other works are recorded on the Sono Luminus label, and featured on Apple Music’s Anna Thorvaldsdottir Essentials Playlist.
Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s music is frequently performed internationally and has been commissioned by many of the world’s leading orchestras, ensembles, and arts organizations, including the Berlin Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Orchestre de Paris, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, Munich Philharmonic, Ensemble Intercontemporain, Danish String Quartet, International Contemporary Ensemble, BBC Proms, and Carnegie Hall. Her “detailed and powerful” (The Guardian) orchestral writing has garnered her awards from the New York Philharmonic, Lincoln Center, the Nordic Council, and the UK’s Ivors Academy. Anna was Composer-in-Residence with the Iceland Symphony Orchestra from 2018-2023, and was in 2023 also in residence at the Aldeburgh Festival and the Tanglewood Festival of Contemporary Music. She holds a PhD from the University of California in San Diego, and is currently based in the London area.
The music of Anna Thorvaldsdottir is published by Chester Music, part of Wise Music Group.
For more information about Anna Thorvaldsdottir: www.annathorvalds.com/bio