Introduce Yourself: Olafur Arnalds

Over the last couple of years, Icelander Ólafur Arnalds has been one of a handful of young composers shining light on the modern classical scene, a collection of musicians re-casting both the content and listenership of classical music. His releases to date, all on Erased Tapes, from debut ‘Eulogy for Evolution’, to his breathtaking follow-up EP ‘Variations of Static’, to the recently released ‘Found Songs’, have seen this multi-instrumentalist compile a collection of unforgettable, swooping, soaring, cinematic soundscapes. Forget whether classical music is your bag, this is for anyone with a penchant for songs that are as heart-wrenching one minute as they are edifying the next, tranquil and placid one instance, setting your pulse racing the next. It’s raw, evocative and challenging in all the right ways, and you’d be hard pushed to find an artist making more touching or more soul-stirring music than this in 2009.

We’re sharers by nature here at fabric, so we caught up with Ólafur so both you and I could get to know him a little better…

Being both a classical musician and an electronic artist, what was your route into music, and what kind of a journey have your tastes been on since then?

I studied a number of instruments through my youth and ended up with drums as my main instrument, I played drums in a few punk and rock bands as well as some jazz. So I’ve always been listening to some more underground music.  I was always playing some piano on the side though and listening to classical music as well. Basically I listen to pretty much anything…As long as it’s good, I don’t care what people call it.

When did you decide you wanted to devote yourself to being an artist?

I guess I’ve always wanted to be an artist. When I was studying drums, I really wanted to be a session drummer, I also wanted to be a producer…But me ending up as a neo-classical composer was much more of a coincidence. I was just playing around with it at first, released the first album more for fun. But people really liked it and things started happening, so it’s become my job.



Ólafur Arnalds - Ljósið (Official Music Video) from Erased Tapes on Vimeo.

What is your creative, and technical, process when writing music?  Considering there are no lyrics and it's not aimed at the dancefloor – are you trying to convey a message or story to the listener, or is it more a mood or feeling, or something else altogether?

When I’m writing I think I’m mostly just writing for myself. I’m usually either trying to convey some feeling that I’m feeling at that moment and exploring the technique of how I can do that. The beauty of not having lyrics is also that the ‘story’ or ‘mood’ can be a bit open, there is no voice telling you what this song is about, so the listener can make up his/her own story. Sometimes the same song means something totally different to the listener than it does to me. I find this very interesting.

What do you think Bach would have made of your music?

He would probably think it’s shit. But I hope he would be happy to see how much his theory has influenced me.

Many people I have recommended your music to have been (very pleasantly) surprised to find young people making music like yours today. What would you say your audience is, and how do you find young music fans react to your work?

I think my audience is exactly that – people from all corners of the musical world, many of them just discovering this kind of music. This is music that can speak to almost everyone. Young people react even more to this than older people because it’s simple and it has a lot of mainstream/pop/electronic elements even though it’s basically classical music.

How do your live performances work?

Usually we are 5 on stage. Me on piano with my laptop and lots of electronics by my side. The piano runs through some of those electronics so I can treat or loop the sound of that. Then I have a string quartet on stage. However I’m in the process of adding some more people because the new album I’m working on has a lot of additional instruments.



What gave you the idea for the (most recent album) ‘Found Songs’ concept?

I had a lot of ideas for songs that I never had any reason or opportunity to finish and make into full songs. Songs that wouldn’t really have fit into my other albums and I was afraid that when I would find some space for them they would be old ideas and I’d rather just make new ones. So I decided to release them for free. The one song per day thing was an idea that came later, I don’t know why, I guess I just wanted to challenge myself – It also made the project to be more of a “thing” and tied everything together, gave people something to talk about.

The album was initially free, what are your thoughts on the music industry and the future for selling recorded music?

I don’t think I have space here to say everything I have to say on that subject, haha. But generally I don’t believe that music should be free. But today if people want something for free they can easily get it – so I would rather they get it from me. I believe in interactivity between the fans and the artists and keeping everyone involved (hence the artwork for ‘Found Songs’ CD release being made by fans). People, and especially young people, have gotten used to getting songs for free so I think it’s pointless to try to fight it anymore, I’d rather concentrate on selling records to the people who still want to own records – and for the rest we’ll just have to find other ways for them to contribute. ‘Found Songs’ had all of these things – so it was definitely also an experiment in releasing music in the current state of the industry.

What is in the future for Ólafur Arnalds, and is there any variation in the direction you will be taking with your music?

Of course I hope I don’t stay the same forever, I plan to keep evolving and challenging myself. I’m currently finishing up the recordings for my next album, and that’s definitely going into a little bit of a different direction.

We’ve also heard a couple of your techno tracks under the name Kiasmos.  Can you tell us a bit about that project?

It’s just this thing me and my friend Janus started after we realised we had a common interest in deep, dark, percussive techno. It’s mostly just a hobby we like to do in our free time, but it’s a lot of fun and we have been touring a little bit and it’s been going really well, so hopefully it will turn into something more soon!

How do you see your career developing with two such diverse prongs?

These two things don’t have to relate to each other at all, for the listeners it can just be like two different people doing two different things. But I’d hate to get stuck just doing the same kind of music for the rest of my life. Music is just music, and if I want to master the art of ‘music’ then I have a need to get into every aspect of music that interests me.