Víkingur Ólafsson Continues His Journey Through the Music of Johann Sebastian Bach
As he continues his epic tour of J.S. Bach’s equally epic Goldberg Variations, Víkingur Ólafsson announces the release of a series of six new Bach singles. Recorded at Reykjavík’s Harpa concert hall in January, the tracks feature piano arrangements of sacred pieces by Bach, four of which have been realised by Ólafsson himself. All six of these gem-like recordings reveal, once again, the pianist’s profound affinity with the composer’s music.
The first single, presenting Ólafsson’s arrangement of the bass aria “Es ist vollbracht” from the Cantata, BWV 159 will be issued digitally on 5 April 2024. An EP including all six works will be released by Deutsche Grammophon digitally and on vinyl on 18 October.
Víkingur Ólafsson has learned much about Bach’s music through the process of analysing both vocal and instrumental scores in order to transcribe them for the piano. Having included one cantata arrangement on his award-winning Johann Sebastian Bach album, he has now prepared four more for this series. As well as “Es ist vollbracht”, he has arranged the choruses “Ich hatte viel Bekümmernis” from BWV 21 (out on 17 May) and “Weinen, Klagen, Sorgen, Zagen” from BWV 12 (21 June) and “Nach dir, Herr, verlanget mich” from BWV 150 (19 July).
The pianist has also recorded two arrangements by other composers. A four-hands version of the chorale prelude Das alte Jahr vergangen ist, BWV 614, arranged by the legendary Hungarian composer György Kurtág, is set for release on 20 September. Ólafsson performs the work with his wife, Halla Oddný Magnúsdottir, who also appeared on From Afar. Whereas his reading of the sacred song Komm, süßer Tod, BWV 478, arranged by Harold Bauer (1873-1951) will be issued on 18 October, alongside the EP.
Now approaching the home straight of his six-continent, season-long Goldberg Variations tour, Ólafsson is continuing to earn huge audience ovations and critical acclaim wherever he goes. Recent highlights include his Carnegie Hall and Australian debuts. The remaining dates take him to Zürich, Montevideo, São Paulo, Los Angeles, Costa Mesa, Berkeley, Seattle, Dortmund, Abu Dhabi, Shanghai, Singapore, Hong Kong, Kaohsiung, Hamburg and, finally, Schloss Elmau in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, which is where the 90‑date epic tour began in August 2023.
“To say this recital … was wonderful, even miraculous, is to undersell it. To only be able to give it five stars seems paltry … Ólafsson managed to find colours that we never knew were there”
Limelight, reviewing Ólafsson’s Sydney Opera House Goldberg Variations recital (18 March 2024)
Ólafsson’s Goldberg Variations recording was released last October to unanimous critical acclaim. Chosen as a “best of 2023” album by The New York Times, The Boston Globe, the Financial Times and The Guardian, it achieved extraordinary international chart and streaming success. It also helped to increase his audience on social media and led to his becoming the most streamed living Bach pianist of 2023.
Víkingur Ólafsson is one of the most sought-after artists on the global stage today. His multiple awards include OPUS KLASSIK Instrumentalist of the Year (2023), OPUS KLASSIK Solo Recording Instrumental (twice), CoScan’s International Nordic Person of the Year (2023) and the Rolf Schock Prize for Music (2022). His DG recordings – Philip Glass Piano Works (2017), Johann Sebastian Bach (2018), Debussy · Rameau (2020), Mozart & Contemporaries (2021), From Afar (2022) and Bach · Goldberg Variations (2023) – have captured the public and critical imagination and led to career streams so far of almost one billion.
Celebrated for his visionary interpretations of J.S. Bach, Víkingur Ólafsson, one of the greatest pianists and musical minds of today, now embraces Bach’s monumental Goldberg Variations. Ólafsson devotes his entire next season to touring the work globally across six continents, while October 2023 marks the anticipated album release on Deutsche Grammophon. “I have dreamed of recording this work for 25 years,” says the Icelandic pianist.
The album follows Ólafsson’s hugely successful DG recording of works by the composer, Johann Sebastian Bach (2018), which won BBC Music magazine’s Album of the Year, Opus Klassik’s Solo Recital award, numerous other recording of the year accolades and led to him being named Gramophone magazine’s Artist of the Year. Now Ólafsson brings his unique musical vision, and an affecting, meticulous recorded sound to Bach’s masterpiece.
Ólafsson dedicates his 2023-24 season to a Goldberg Variations world tour, performing the work across six continents throughout the year. He brings Bach’s masterpiece to major concert halls including London’s Southbank Centre, New York’s Carnegie Hall, Wiener Konzerthaus, Philharmonie de Paris, Tokyo’s Suntory Hall, Philharmonie Berlin, Harpa Concert Hall, Sydney Opera House, LA’s Walt Disney Hall, Sala São Paulo, Shanghai Symphony Hall, Tonhalle Zurich, KKL Luzern, Alte Oper Frankfurt, Mupa Budapest and Teatro Colón, to name a few.
“The Goldberg Variations contain some of the most virtuosic keyboard music ever written, some of the most astonishingly brilliant uses of counterpoint in the repertoire and countless instances of exalted poetry, abstract contemplation and deep pathos – all within immaculately shaped structures of formal perfection. In 30 variations, built on the humble harmonic framework of a simple, graceful aria, Bach turns limited material into boundless variety like no one before or since. He is the greatest keyboard virtuoso of his time.” comments Víkingur Ólafsson.
He continues: “Like with some of Bach’s other works on this scale, I was inclined to think of the Goldberg Variations as a grand, commanding cathedral of music, magnificent in its structure and intricate in its ornamentation. Now I find another metaphor more apt: That of a grand oak tree, no less magnificent, but somehow organic, living and vibrant, its forms both responsive and regenerative, its leaves constantly unfurling to produce musical oxygen for its admirers through some metaphysical, time-bending photosynthesis.”
In just a few short years, Ólafsson has become one of the most sought-after artists of today, performing internationally at the highest level. His multiple awards include CoScan’s International Nordic Person of the Year (2023), the Rolf Schock Prize for Music (2022), Gramophone magazine’s Artist of the Year (2019), Opus Klassik Solo Recording Instrumental (twice) and Album of the Year at the BBC Music Magazine Awards (2019). In 2023, Ólafsson is nominated for three Opus Klassik awards, including Instrumentalist of the Year.
His recordings for Deutsche Grammophon – Philip Glass Piano Works (2017), Johann Sebastian Bach (2018), Debussy Rameau (2020), Mozart & Contemporaries (2021) and From Afar (2022) – captured the public and critical imagination and have led to career streams of over 600 million.
A captivating communicator both on and off stage, Ólafsson’s significant talent extends to broadcast, having presented several of his own series for television and radio. He was Artist in Residence for three months on BBC Radio 4’s flagship arts programme, Front Row – broadcasting live during lockdown from an empty Harpa concert hall in Reykjavík, and reaching millions of listeners around the world.
Víkingur Ólafsson’s latest album, From Afar, was met with widespread acclaim, praised for its evocative and contemplative beauty. Recorded on both upright and grand pianos, From Afar reflects on the pianist’s childhood memories in Iceland and features works by Bach, Mozart, Schumann, Brahms, Bartók, Thomas Adès and György Kurtág, alongside Icelandic and Hungarian folk songs.
Inspired by Ólafsson’s remarkable interpretations, six contemporary composers have now produced a set of six atmospheric reinventions of works from the album. His musical tales captured the imagination of Álfheiður Guðmundsdóttir, Herdís Stefánsdóttir, Michael A. Muller, Snorri Hallgrímsson, Helgi Jonsson and Christian Badzura. From Afar · Reworks is released as a digital EP today, on 26 May 2023.
Víkingur Ólafsson comments: “I have for a long time been taken by the idea of reversing the creative process of classical performance: to open my recorded interpretations up to being used as compositional material in new works. I am thus more than delighted to witness the wonderful artists gathered on this release doing me the honour of rethinking and redefining my From Afar album, showing ever new ways to think about the music I thought I knew like the palm of my hand. I hope you enjoy the fruit of their labour as much as I have.”
Ólafsson’s renditions of Schumann’s “Vogel als Prophet” have sparked three different but equally creative responses from composer and electronic musician Herdís Stefánsdottir (“Nightbird”), Balmorhea’s Michael A. Muller (“Bird as Prophet”), and composer and producer Snorri Hallgrímsson (“The Plover and the Raven”). Like Stefánsdottir, soprano and visual artist Álfheiður Guðmundsdóttir adds vocals to her rework, “Notturno”, inspired by Brahms’s Intermezzo, op. 116 no. 4, while multi-instrumentalist and singer-songwriter Helgi Jonsson has chosen to reinterpret Schumann’s “Träumerei” for his “Reverie”. Finally, Christian Badzura draws on the style of Brahms’s late solo piano works for his “Sung (After Brahms)”.
“Notturno”, “The Plover and the Raven” and “Sung (After Brahms)” were already available to stream. “Bird as Prophet” is released alongside the full digital EP today on 26 May.
Celebrated for his innovative programming and award-winning recordings, Icelandic pianist Víkingur Ólafsson is offering a window into his musical life story with his new album, From Afar. Due for release on 7 October on Deutsche Grammophon, the highly personal double album reflects Ólafsson’s musical DNA, from childhood memories growing up in Iceland to his international career and contemporary inspirations.
Recorded on both upright and grand pianos, the album captures two distinct sound worlds with works by Bach, Mozart, Schumann, Brahms and Bartók, alongside Icelandic and Hungarian folk songs, a world premiere by Thomas Adès, transcriptions by Ólafsson himself, and interconnecting pieces composed by his hero, 96 year-old Hungarian composer and pianist György Kurtág. The first single, Ave Maria by Sigvaldi Kaldalóns, is released today (listen HERE) along with a new video of Ólafsson introducing the album.
The album was inspired by Ólafsson’s life-changing meeting with György Kurtág in Budapest in September 2021, which left him with “a feeling of lightness and joy” and sparked memories of music he loved as a child. From Afar (a title inspired by Kurtág’s Aus der Ferne) is both a tribute to his hero and a return to his musical roots. “It is more personal than my previous work,” says Ólafsson. “It connects very deeply to my childhood and it pays homage to one of my favourite composers of all time. Throughout the album, there are intimate conversations and messages from afar – closely knit canons, transcriptions and dedications, as well as distant echoes of nearly forgotten, ancient melodies.”
In a bold move, Ólafsson has recorded the album twice – on grand piano and on felt-covered upright, offering the same music with two different timbres. He captures the intimacy granted by the upright, as well as the full palette possible with the grand piano. Ólafsson’s own childhood was marked by his relationship with two such pianos: his parents’ grand piano (which they bought before they could afford a house!) and an old upright piano he was given at the age of seven and whose “warm, dreamy” sound he grew to love as he practised Schumann, Bach and Mozart in his bedroom. Kurtág himself often recorded on felted pianos for variations of dynamics and tone.
Exploring such evocative themes as home, childhood and family, the album features Hungarian and Icelandic folk songs, nature-inspired works, interwoven homages and three previously unreleased transcriptions by Ólafsson: the Adagio from Bach’s Sonata for solo violin in C major, Mozart’s Laudate Dominum – which he dedicates to Kurtág – and Icelandic composer Sigvaldi Kaldalóns’ Ave Maria (the first work Ólafsson ever transcribed). Ave Maria is the first single from the album – a musical prayer which Ólafsson performed as Lockdown Artist in Residence for BBC Radio 4’s Front Row in 2020, broadcasting live from an empty Harpa concert hall in Reykjavík and bringing solace to millions of listeners around the world.
Ólafsson performs with his wife, Halla Oddný Magnúsdottir, in Kurtág’s transcription of Bach’s three-handed arrangement of Trio Sonata No. 1, which the composer used to perform with his late wife, Márta. György Kurtág, in turn, recently dedicated this transcription to Ólafsson. Additionally, Magnúsdottir and Ólafsson duet on Kurtág’s Twittering. Also on the album is the world premiere recording of Thomas Adès’ The Branch, an otherworldly waltz written specially for Ólafsson.
From Afar is the latest recording from the “new superstar of classical piano” (Daily Telegraph) which has seen the Icelander achieve over 400 million career streams and top classical charts around the world; win Gramophone Artist of the Year (2019), BBC Music Magazine Album of the Year (2019) for Johann Sebastian Bach and the Opus Klassik Solo Recording Instrumental award (twice). He has performed at many of the world’s major international venues including the Royal Albert Hall and Carnegie Hall and, in the coming months, opens the classical music seasons at the Southbank Centre in London and Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, and debuts with the Berlin Philharmonic and New York Philharmonic orchestras.
After the global success of Víkingur Ólafsson’s recordings of Philip Glass · Piano Works, Johann Sebastian Bach, and Debussy · Rameau (with 225 million career streams and 320K albums sold), the multi-award-winning pianist now turns his attention to the music of Mozart.
For his latest album, Ólafsson presents some of his favourite Mozart keyboard works in the company of pieces by a selection of the composer’s leading contemporaries. Juxtaposing works by Mozart, Haydn and C.P.E. Bach with rarely-recorded Galuppi and Cimarosa, Mozart & Contemporaries dispels the image of Mozart as the angelic and prodigious idiot savant, instead presenting a mature composer through music primarily dating from the 1780s: a resourceful, hard-working adult who had come to know adversity. All is artfully brought together by Ólafsson’s signature thought-provoking programming.
Ólafsson comments: “I find this decade of Mozart’s life and art endlessly fascinating. Mozart was not just a composer, and I feel that when he was writing for himself as a virtuoso pianist he indulged more than ever in the sublime playfulness that lay at the core of his originality and inventiveness. This is the period when Mozart was not just perfecting the Classical tradition but subtly subverting it… the shadows are darker, the nuances and ambiguities more profound.”
“Víkingur Ólafsson is revitalising classical music” – The Economist
Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach (1714–1788); Joseph Haydn (1732–1809); Baldassare Galuppi (1706–1785); and Domenico Cimarosa (1749–1801): “Perhaps all four provide a chance to calibrate the contemporary ear towards the prevailing ideas, styles and tastes of the times”, comments Ólafsson. “It is my hope that this particular context, a mix of the celebrated and the obscure, can slightly alter our psychological attunement, removing some of the baggage we all bring with us to Mozart’s music. This is in any case what I set out to do for myself: to approach even the best-known works of Mozart with the same freedom and childlike enthusiasm I felt upon discovering the rare and staggeringly lyrical works from the likes of Galuppi and Cimarosa.”
Mozart: a bird of a different feather
Mozart & Contemporaries provides a fascinating snapshot of a decade when changes were brewing, composers were experimenting, and Mozart was writing such visionary pieces as the Sonata in C minor K457. The album – the pianist’s fourth for Deutsche Grammophon – also includes Ólafsson’s own transcriptions: haunting arrangements of two sonatas by Cimarosa, plus a masterful solo piano transcription of the great Adagio in E flat major from Mozart’s String Quintet K516. To conclude the album, Mozart’s Adagio in B minor K540 quietly transitions into Franz Liszt’s transcription of the motet Ave verum corpus, composed in Mozart’s final year. The vocal lines’ ascension to the piano’s higher registers is viewed by Ólafsson as representing a final sense of death and transfiguration.
Ólafsson concludes, “I feel like, when I play Mozart, that I get to know myself as a musician. I get to know sides that I didn’t before. He seems to reflect your innermost core in music.”
Víkingur Ólafsson’s new album Mozart & Contemporaries will be released on 3 September 2021 and can be pre-ordered here.
Víkingur Ólafsson releases the second EP from his new project Reflections. This project showcases contemporary reworks of the music of the two revolutionary French composers, Debussy and Rameau, that Ólafsson released earlier this year. Ólafsson says: “I wanted to explore certain works from fresh perspectives, to reimagine them and invite other composers to rework elements of these extraordinary pieces. I’m delighted that Deutsche Grammophon agreed with me on continuing this creative conversation with Debussy, Rameau and some of today’s most imaginative musicians.”
This second EP Reflections Part 2 is released today and will be followed by the release of two more EPs, in February and March respectively, while the full album will be released on CD and LP on 12 March 2021. The exclusive crystal clear 2LP vinyl limited fan edition of Reflections is available for pre-order now and also set for release on 12 March 2021.
Víkingur Ólafsson presents "Triad" - This limited edition features three outstanding albums by Ólafsson in a box set including additional fan content and deluxe packaging. With three albums on Deutsche Grammophon so far Ólafsson is known as one of the most exciting pianists of today and widely acknowledged for his “individuality of spirit and intelligence of execution” (Limelight Magazine).
His albums from 2017, 2018 and 2020 comprise a broad scope of repertoire including Philip Glass, J. S. Bach, Claude Debussy and Jean-Philippe Rameau. This box set is released today, 4 December 2020.
Today, the first EP from Víkingur Ólafsson’s new project “Reflections” is released. This project showcases contemporary reworks of the music of the two revolutionary French composers, Debussy and Rameau, that Ólafsson released earlier this year. Ólafsson says: “I wanted to explore certain works from fresh perspectives, to reimagine them and invite other composers to rework elements of these extraordinary pieces. I’m delighted that Deutsche Grammophon agreed with me on continuing this creative conversation with Debussy, Rameau and some of today’s most imaginative musicians.”
This first EP Reflections Part 1 is released today, on November 20, 2020 and will be followed by the release of three more EPs, in January, February and March respectively, while the full album will be released on CD and LP on 12 March 2021.
Víkingur Ólafsson has been invited to curate the Apple Music 'Piano Chill' playlist for the week starting Friday 20th November. Read what Víkingur had to say about his selection and influences for the playlist below.
"I love to create my own playlists and am happy to put together Piano Chill for you on Apple Music. It has mostly tranquil sounds from different, wonderful artists, from John Cage’s In a Landscape to Fréderic Chopin’s Waltz in A minor, Johannes Brahms’ Intermezzo in E flat to Jóhann Jóhannsson’s Englabörn Rework, J.S. Bach’s Organ Sonata to Keith Jarrett’s Answer Me. Our listening to music is always influenced by its context, what comes before and what follows. I hope you will enjoy the path I’ve suggested on this occasion."
- Víkingur Heiðar Ólafsson
The curation ended on November 26.
Víkingur Ólafsson launches his new project “Reflections” today with his world premiere recording of Hania Rani’s reimagining of Debussy’s La Damoiselle élue. The Polish pianist, composer and singer places Debussy’s sublime music within a meditative electroacoustic soundscape. Her score reiterates the opening chords of the original piece while adding bell-like piano arpeggios and gentle layers of sound colour to the mix, evoking melancholy impressions of a mysterious dreamworld.
The “Reflections” project will showcase contemporary reworks of the music of the two revolutionary French composers, Debussy and Rameau, that Olafsson released earlier this year. Ólafsson says: “I wanted to explore certain works from fresh perspectives, to reimagine them and invite other composers to rework elements of these extraordinary pieces. I’m delighted that Deutsche Grammophon agreed with me on continuing this creative conversation with Debussy, Rameau and some of today’s most imaginative musicians.”
This single will be followed by the release of four EPs, in November, January, February and March respectively, while the full album will be released on CD and LP on 12 March 2021.
Reflections will also include reworks by Ólafsson himself and by other groundbreaking artists including Icelandic singer-songwriter Helgi Jónsson, genre-defying Icelandic duo Hugar, Texas-based post-rock minimalist ensemble Balmorhea and Christian Badzura, Vice President A&R New Repertoire at Deutsche Grammophon. Interwoven with these will be Ólafsson’s previously unreleased recordings of Debussy’s Pour le piano and a selection of pieces from the same composer’s Préludes, two of which – ‘Bruyères’ and ‘Canope’ – have been recorded on both an upright piano and a Steinway to offer very contrasting listening experiences.
Víkingur Ólafsson’s original album Debussy · Rameau (2020) has already surpassed 21 million streams, bringing Ólafsson’s total streams to over 125 million and leading the Daily Telegraph to proclaim him “The new superstar of classical piano.” As well as being a major public success, the album has garnered widespread critical acclaim, including a Diapason d’Or, The Sunday Times Album of the Week, Editor’s Choice in Gramophone magazine, and Recording of the Month in BBC Music Magazine, as well as winning the 2020 OPUS KLASSIK Award for Solo Recording of the Year (piano).
Víkingur Ólafsson’s remarkable originality and powerful musical conviction have seen him, in just a few years, take the music world by storm to become one of the most sought-after artists of today. The global success of Debussy · Rameau follows that of his award-winning Johann Sebastian Bach album and its sister release, Bach Reworks, featuring reimaginings by such diverse artists as Peter Gregson, Hildur Guðnadóttir, Ryuichi Sakamoto, and Skúli Sverrisson. The same thread of inspiration will run through his forthcoming release, Debussy · Rameau Reflections, as Ólafsson and his fellow composers celebrate the work of two French masters and translate their musical languages into a contemporary idiom.
Deutsche Grammophon is delighted to announce the launch of its international podcast series. It will be hosted by the British horn player Sarah Willis. Her first guest is Víkingur Ólafsson, who amongst other topics talks of course about the music by Debussy and Rameau that he has paired for his new solo album.
Find our new international podcast in the streaming platform of your choice!
Víkingur Ólafsson’s third Deutsche Grammophon album Debussy·Rameau explores affinities between the music of two French musical giants – out on 27 March. First single Rameau’s Les Tendres Plaintes is out now
After the remarkable global success of his award-winning J.S. Bach recording, celebrated Icelandic pianist Víkingur Ólafsson returns with his third Deutsche Grammophon solo album, Debussy · Rameau, set for release on 27 March. It juxtaposes pieces by two of the greatest French composers – both musical revolutionaries – exploring the contrasts and common ground between them. The innovative new recording follows Ólafsson’s extraordinary albums Philip Glass Piano Works and Johann Sebastian Bach.
"This album is set up as a dialogue between two of my favourite composers, Jean-Philippe Rameau and Claude Debussy. I see them as musical brothers, kindred spirits even though one was 180 years older than the other. They were musicians of the future, who loved to stir things up. They were two uniquely gifted keyboard composers, two progressive and fiercely original musical thinkers who could capture incredibly evocative images through sound. I want to show Rameau as a futurist and I want to emphasise Debussy’s deep roots in the French baroque – and in Rameau’s music in particular. The idea is that the listener almost forgets who is who, while listening to the album.” – Víkingur Ólafsson on Debussy · Rameau
Ingenious works of remarkable diversity, Rameau’s keyboard works are rarely programmed or recorded on today’s modern instrument. Ólafsson discovered the great Baroque composer’s keyboard music during his student days in New York, courtesy of Emil Gilels’ Deutsche Grammophon recording of Le Rappel des oiseaux. “I was immediately fascinated by the music and how well it lends itself to the modern piano, at least in Gilels’ noble rendition, with its layered textures and light and shades,” he recalls. Keen to communicate this world of wonder, Ólafsson transcribed for modern piano an interlude from Rameau’s opera Les Boréades – to stunning effect: The Arts and the Hours, accompanied by a music video, will be the third single from the album following on from first single Les Tendres Plaintes, a jewel from Rameau’s Pièces de clavecin (out now), and Debussy’s La Fille aux Cheveux de Lin (21 February).
This voyage of musical discovery introduced Ólafsson to the immaculate blend of “freedom and discipline” in Rameau’s piano writing, qualities which he also recognised in the piano music of Debussy. “As extraordinary innovators of both harmony and form, with a unique ear for colour and a keen sense of the theatrical, both composers wrote music which engages more senses than just that of hearing”, he observes. “And both enjoyed giving their compositions titles that stimulate the imagination – the music itself ranging from the purely programmatic to the entirely abstract. All these things inform the way the music of this album has been selected and arranged. As in previous albums, however, I have let the music itself guide me, rather than any fixed ideology.”
The album opens with Debussy’s rarely performed La Damoiselle élue, a work existing in the space between life and death, a conversation between those who cannot converse. It is an appropriate starting point for this conversation between two great composers – the perfect curtain-opener to a remarkable new album.
The infinitely inspirational power of Bach’s music can be heard on Víkingur Ólafsson’s Bach Reworks, bringing together atmospheric reworkings of music by composers such as Hans-Joachim Roedelius, Ben Frost, Peter Gregson and Valgeir Sigurðsson – reimaginings that artfully defragment the creations of Bach. Bach Reworks / Part 2 is now available for download and streaming. Both Part 1 and Part 2 together are now available on vinyl.
