Ice Music Festival Norway (initiated 2006 in Geilo, Norway) is a "glacial instrument" festival founded by

Terje Isungset Terje Isungset (born May 4, 1964) is a Norwegian drummer. From his background in jazz and traditional Scandinavian music, he has designed musical instruments from non-traditional materials, including ice. Career Isungset was raised in Geil ...

together with Pål Knutsson Medhus. Isungset had the idea behind the festival and remains the creative director. The festival is unique because everything, including the venue, instruments, and art, is made of ice and snow. The last three years, the festival has been located at Finse. For 2021, the festival will for the first time be arranged at Bergsjøstølen, Ål kommune. Around 30 volunteers and students work alongside ice carvers, designers, ice cutters, architects and artists for 10 days leading up to the festival to make adequate preparations.

Background

The Ice Music Festival has been an annual event since 2006, showcasing music performed on instruments made from ice.

is the founder of the ice music as a phenomenon, and he has been travelling around the whole world with ice music concerts since 1999. Isungset had the idea of making a festival where everyone participating must create their art using only ice and snow. This requirement allowed for a pool of creativity among musicians, dancers, and other artists. In recent years, several students from the

University of Bergen The University of Bergen ( no, Universitetet i Bergen, ) is a research-intensive state university located in Bergen, Norway. As of 2019, the university has over 4,000 employees and 18,000 students. It was established by an act of parliament in 194 ...

have been participating in the program as well. Isungset is in charge of the record label All Ice Records, and the festival cooperates with this label in producing ice music. AIR distributes their own music on all digital platforms, and are aiming to release at least one album per year, with one release at the first full moon of each year. The festival takes place in Ål, a small village close to Hardangervidda in Norway. Since 2006, the concert venue has been moved around several times, from Geilo to Finse - and now Ål. The stages are built from scratch every year, which is a major art project completed by the students from UiB.

Profile

With the ice as the foundation for the festival, the program is entirely tailored around it. Nevertheless, every version of the festival is different. Every year, a new "instrument of the year" is made. Over the years, this has included the ice-

kantele A kantele () or kannel () is a traditional Finnish and Karelian plucked string instrument (chordophone) belonging to the south east Baltic box zither family known as the Baltic psaltery along with Estonian kannel, Latvian kokles, Lithuania ...

, ice- didgeridoo, ice-harp, ice-

udu The udu is a plosive aerophone (in this case implosive) and an idiophone of the Igbo people, Igbo of Nigeria. In the Igbo language, ''ùdù'' means 'vessel'. Actually being a water jug with an additional hole, it was played by Igbo women for ce ...

, ice-drum, ice-

balafon The balafon is a gourd-resonated xylophone, a type of struck idiophone. It is closely associated with the neighbouring Mandé, Senoufo and Gur peoples of West Africa, particularly the Guinean branch of the Mandinka ethnic group, but is now f ...

, ice-

hardanger fiddle A Hardanger fiddle ( no, hardingfele) is a traditional stringed instrument considered to be the national instrument of Norway. In modern designs, this type of fiddle is very similar to the violin, though with eight or nine strings (rather than ...

, tub-ice, ice-leik, ice-bass, ice-ofon, ice-trumpet, ice-horn and ice-percussion. The festival focuses strongly on music, but the festival is also meant to highlight a focus on the climate crisis, as melting icecaps is one of the clearest signs of global warming. Bjerknes Centre for Climate Research in Bergen is doing research on global warming, and the festival cooperates with scientists, who give lectures during the festival. Many various musicians have participated in the festival over the years, including

Arve Henriksen Arve Henriksen (born 22 March 1968) is a Norwegian trumpeter. Career Henriksen was born in Stranda and educated on the Jazz program at Trondheim Musikkonservatorium; he later studied music pedagogy, while he played in «Bodega Band» (1987� ...

Anders Jormin Anders Bertil Michael Jormin (born 7 September 1957) is a Swedish bassist and composer. Jormin established a musical partnership with Bobo Stenson in the mid-1980s which led to international recognition playing with Charles Lloyd, in the early ...

‚ Miss Tati, Eirik Glambek Bøe and Sara Marielle Gaup. Complete artist overview found below. The musicians cover many different genres, from folk music and jazz to pop and R&B, and they all have different origins. Their collaboration at the Ice Music Festival creates music like no other.

Press coverage

Various press from Norway and the rest of the world have visited and documented the Ice Music Festival: Norway

Bergens Tidende ''Bergens Tidende'' is Norway's fifth-largest newspaper, and the country's largest newspaper outside Oslo. ''Bergens Tidende'' is owned by the public company Schibsted ASA. Norwegian owners held a mere 42% of the shares in Schibsted at the end ...

Drammens Tidende ''Drammens Tidende'' is a Norwegian Bokmål language newspaper published in Drammen, Norway. History and profile The former ''Drammens Tidende'' dates back to 2 January 1832, when it was known as ''Tiden'', taking the new name in thirteen years la ...

Verdens Gang ''Verdens Gang'' ("The course of the world"), generally known under the abbreviation ''VG'', is a Norwegian tabloid newspaper. In 2016, circulation numbers stood at 93,883, having declined from a peak circulation of 390,510 in 2002. ''VG'' is n ...

NRK NRK, an abbreviation of the Norwegian ''Norsk Rikskringkasting AS'', generally expressed in English as the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation, is the Norwegian government-owned radio and television public broadcasting company, and the largest ...

, TV 2,

Aftenposten ( in the masthead; ; Norwegian for "The Evening Post") is Norway's largest printed newspaper by circulation. It is based in Oslo. It sold 211,769 copies in 2015 (172,029 printed copies according to University of Bergen) and estimated 1.2 milli ...

, Ringerikes Blad, Bergensavisen, Hallingdølen, Radio Hallingdal‚ Hytta Vår. Europe Deutsche Welle, Die Zeit,

Südwest Presse ''Südwest Presse'' is a German daily newspaper based in Ulm, which is distributed in Ulm, Neu-Ulm, Alb-Donau-Kreis and Landkreis Neu-Ulm. It is also the name of a regional cooperative venture (called a ''Zeitungsverbund'' – newspaper composite ...

, GEO, Jazzism,

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...

...

Background

Profile

Press coverage

Artists

References

External links