Tectonics is a Music Festival curated by Ilan Volkov, proudly presented by Iceland Symphony Orchestra. It takes place in Harpa Concert Hall in Reykjavík 10.- 12. April 2014

The third Tectonics Reykjavík will take place from 10th to 12th April in Harpa Concert Hall in Reykjavík, Iceland.  As before Tectonics will be full of energetic experiments and surprises with emphasis on mixing performers and composers with different backgrounds and styles.

Ilan Volkov, chief conductor and musical director of Iceland Symphony Orchestra is the curator of Tectonics, which has now reached Scotland, Israel and Australia.

The Iceland Symphony Orchestra will premier 6 works by 7 different Icelandic composers. These are: Bergrún Snæbjörnsdóttir, Davíð Brynjar Franzson, María Huld Markan, Ólöf Arnalds/Skúli Sverrisson, Páll Ivan Pálsson, and Valgeir Sigurðsson. Ólöf Arnalds will be the solo singer in a piece composed by herself and Skúli Sverrisson. 

The orchestra will also premier „Earth Plays 1“ by Cathy Milliken who describes her work as „ an imaginary acoustic unlocking of sounds and words once embedded in stone. Earth Plays 1 is the first of four plays and takes place at Þingvellir, Iceland.“

The Norwegian quartet Lemur, will compose a new work and perform with the Orchestra using the spatial possibilities of Eldborg, the main hall of Harpa.

The main guest of Tectonics Reykjavík is American composer, Alvin Lucier. Alvin Lucier has pioneered in many areas of music composition and performance, including the notation of performers' physical gestures, the use of brain waves in live performance, the generation of visual imagery by sound in vibrating media, and the evocation of room acoustics for musical purposes. Performances at the festival include such pieces as „Music for Solo Performer for enormously amplified brain waves and percussion“ and „Nothing is real for piano, amplified teapot, tape recorder and miniature sound system.”

The other American attending Tectonics Reykjavík is Grouper / Liz Harris who will do her solo performance in the main hall.  From Scotland we will get “Asparagus Piss Raindrop “a crypto-conceptual science-fiction anti-band formed from a dreadful, ever expanding pool of improviser/composer/performers.” They will perform in the different open spaces of Harpa.

The Iceland Symphony Youth Orchestra conducted by Ilan Volkov will also perform in the open spaces of Harpa. Angela Rawlings, Bjarni Gunnarsson, Ghostigital, Gyða Valtýsdóttir, Hallveig Ágústsdóttir, and Rúnar Gunnarsson will all perform their own works at Tectonics. The piece by Rúnar, performed in Kaldalón hall, is a 4 hour long marathon of electronic music.

Last but not least eight members of the orchestra will premier works by Romanian composers Iancu Dumitrescu and Ana-Maria Avram.