Atli Ingólfsson (born 1962) is a composer. His works have been performed in new music festivals across Europe and occasionally overseas. His oeuvre comprises a big range of different works, from solo to orchestral to music theatre. Of his chamber works, the most widely performed might be ''Object of Terror'' for chamber group (Ed. Ricordi, Milan), present on his profile CD ''Enter,'' issued by BIS in Stockholm in 2005

Early life and education

He was born in

Njarðvík Njarðvík () is a town in southwestern Iceland, on the peninsula of Reykjanes. As of 2009, its population was 4,400. History In 1995 it merged with the town of Keflavík and the village of Hafnir to form the new municipality of Reykjanesbær. ...

, Iceland where he completed his studies in classical guitar, composition and philosophy before proceeding his composition studies in Italy (Milan Conservatory) and France, finally studying privately with

Gérard Grisey Gérard Henri Grisey (; ; 17 June 1946 – 11 November 1998) was a twentieth-century French composer of contemporary classical music. His work is often associated with the Spectralist Movement in music, of which he was a major pioneer. Biograp ...

Career as composer

After living in Italy from 1990 to 2005 he returned to Iceland where he presently teaches composition at the

Iceland Academy of the Arts Iceland University of the Arts ( ) is an Icelandic institution of higher art education, located in Reykjavík, which offers the only university-level degrees in the arts in Iceland.Lisa Z. ValdimarsdottirIceland Academy of the Arts, Department of ...

. In recent years, Atli has composed three music theatre works which have been staged by Cinnober Theater in Gothenburg, directed by Svante Aulis Löwenborg. These are: ''Suzannah'' (on a text by

Jon Fosse Jon Olav Fosse (; born 29 September 1959) is a Norwegian author, translator, and playwright. In 2023, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature "for his innovative plays and prose which give voice to the unsayable." Fosse's work spans over se ...

), 2005, ''Play Alter Native'' (text by Finn Iunker), 2011, and ''Njals saga'' (text by Ludvig Uhlbors), 2015. "His music has been widely performed at European festivals and concert seasons by groups such as Ensemble InterContemporain, Avanti, the

Arditti Quartet The Arditti Quartet is a string quartet founded in 1974 and led by the British violinist Irvine Arditti. The quartet is a globally recognized promoter of contemporary classical music and has a reputation for having a very wide repertoire. They ...

, Ensemble L'Itinéraire and the Caput Ensemble. He has also published a book of poetry, and has written on the development of Icelandic prosody from a musical perspective. His output consists almost entirely of instrumental works, characterized by a brilliant, colorful musical sound. Several of his works reflect his interest in prosody, and rhythm and metrics may be said to occupy a central role in many of them (A verso, Le pas, les pentes, Envoi, La métrique du cri). In his recent work he has increasingly explored the point of contact between timbre, harmony and rhythm, which in his first String Quartet (HZH) leads to a constant dissolution between prevalently timbral, harmonic, or rhythmic situations, all of them issued from the same structural matrix."

Published works

Atli has authored several articles and essays on metrics, music and music theatre and published a method in traditional harmony, Hljómamál.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ingolfsson, Atli Atli Ingolfsson Atli Ingolfsson 1962 births Living people Milan Conservatory alumni