Vanescere, for solo viola and chamber orchestra (2021)
Written for Þórunn Ósk Marinósdóttir
World premiere: 6. March 2022 with Kammersveit Reykjavíkur, Þórunn Ósk Marinósdóttir and Mirian Khukhunaishvilli at Harpa/Norðurljós (IS)
Myrkir Músíkdagar / Dark Music Days Festival
Recorded by Páll Sveinn Guðmundsson

Programme note:
Veronique Vaka has made it her mission to translate nature’s processes into sound. The viola concerto Vanescere follows her luminous orchestral work Lendh, nominated for the Nordic Council Music Prize, and. zooms-in on principles explored in the cello concerto Gemæltan.

Like Gemæltan, Vasnescere takes as its subject the area around the Sólheimajökull glacier in Iceland. Using geographical and geological analyses, Vaka traced the steady erosion of the glacier over the year from September 2020 and was alarmed at the rapid rate of the ice cap’s retreat. Vasnescere is an abstract representation of the harvested data that underlines the speed of the glacier’s destruction, compressing actual time into musical time. In its direct reaction to the science, the work presents the starkest possible musical depiction of the impact of climate change on the Icelandic landscape. 

In translating her statistical and photographical data into musical notation, Vaka works in two principle ways. One is the establishment of a temporal grid that compresses the 12 month change in the glacier’s appearance into the course of the concerto’s duration. We hear the glacier’s changing shape in movements by degrees: the shifting of one note in a chord, the twisting or contracting of a texture. Within this, the narrating solo viola steps out of the strict time-lapse to focus or reflect on individual events and gestures.

But the harvested data also controls the music’s surface colour, affecting shifts in instrumentation, volume and general expression. A crevice or waterfall might be imagined as a trill or a glissando; a melodic motif might represent ‘calving’ – a piece of ice breaking off as the glacier’s state alters under pressure. Ultimately, elements of the orchestra lose their ability to sustain a quality of sound altogether – the starkest warning yet of the effects of climate change on Vaka’s generation of Icelanders.
-Andrew Mellor, 2022

Vanescere, for solo viola and chamber orchestra (2021)

Neige éternelle: 1. (2022)
for solo violoncello
Written for Sæunn Thorsteinsdóttir
World premiere: 30. September 2022 with Sæunn Thorsteinsdóttir, at Harpa/Norðurljós (IS)

Recorded by RÚV

Programme note:
Neige éternelle: 1. is the first piece of a series of five for solo violoncello.
This work emerged after Gemæltan, a cello concerto written for Sæunn Thorsteinsdóttir.
Each piece is an imagined phase in the formation of a glacier.

Neige éternelle: 1. er fyrsta verkið af fimm sem skrifuð eru fyrir einleiksselló.
Verkið var skrifað í framhaldi selló konsertsins Gemæltan sem tileinkaður er Sæunni Þorsteinsdóttur. 
Hvert verk er ímyndaður fasi í tilurð jökuls.

Neige éternelle: 1.

Ofdune (2020)
Veronique Vaka

Performer: Una Sveinbjarnardóttir
Chamber Music on Valentia, Ireland
August 2022

Photo Credit: Ágúst G. Atlason.

Ofdune

The world première of Gemæltan took place on 29. September 2022 at Harpa/Elborg concert hall in Reykjavík, performed by Sæunn Thorsteinsdóttir and the Iceland Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Eva Ollikainen. Gemæltan is currently nominated for the Icelandic Music Awards 2023 - Composition of the Year (Classical/Contemporary)

Programme note by Andri Snær Magnason: "We are living the most rapid change of Earth’s forces that a single generation has experienced. Glaciers, that before moved at geological speed of centuries and millennia, are now vanishing in a lifetime of a single human being. Nature has left geological speed and moves at human speed. [...]"

More about Gemæltan: https://www.universaledition.com/gemaeltan-vaka-veronique-ues100341-000

Gemæltan, 2020(excerpt)

Fell (2017) for Ensemble
Performed by Caput Ensemble
Conductor: Guðni Franzson
Recorded by the Icelandic National Broadcasting Service.

“Landscape is the work of the mind. Its scenery is built up as much from strata of memory as from layers of rock.” Simon Schama

Fell is an interpretation of the landscape of Önundarfjörður’s region. Mountains and valleys became the core of the work, in parallel with snow patterns, textures, and colours which grew into music parameters. These components guided me through the process of mapping a landscape into musical notation, combining movements and stillness with the memory of a landscape.

The score is available on Iceland Music Information Centre                                                                                                                              
To purchase parts, please contact itm@mic.is

FELL (2017), for Ensemble

Rift (2017) for Orchestra
Performed by the Iceland Symphony Orchestra
Conductor: Daníel Bjarnason
Recorded by the Icelandic National Broadcasting Service.

Rift is the mapping of Búrfellsgjá’s landscape, and I re-imagined the eruption of Búrfell, which occurred around 8000 years ago. The work starts from the caldera making its way to the descending lava channels, which fuse together into a large river of lava, then filters into streams which run all the way into the sea.

Through a combination of imagination and fieldwork, I collected data which evolved into compositional ideas. Landforms became the main structure of the piece, remanence of the flowing lava visible today, sculpted with the passing of time, affected the amplitude as well as the spectra. The numerous fissures created new events, the ever changing colours of the land had an impact on the timbre, and smaller details were expressed with different extended techniques.

The score is available on Iceland Music Information Centre                         
To purchase parts, please contact itm@mic.is

This work was composed as part of "Yrkja" a collaboration between the Iceland Music Information Centre and the Iceland Symphony Orchestra, under the mentorship of Daníel Bjarnason. The workshop provides emerging composers with the opportunity to work closely with the players of the Iceland Symphony Orchestra in composing an orchestral score and preparing for performance. The work's premiere is in January 2018, by the I.S.O., conducted by Daníel Bjarnason

Rift (2017), for Orchestra

Sceadu (2018) for Violin and Chamber Orchestra
Performed by Una Sveinbjarnardóttir and Caput Ensemble
Conducted by Guðni Franzson
Recorded by Stúdíó Sýrland.

"Sceadu er hluti af rannsókn minni á landslagi og yfirfærslu þess í tónmál. Þungamiðja verksins er sambandið milli tveggja sjónarhorna á landslagið, milli fjarlægðar og nálægðar. Þessi tvö sjónarhorn endurspeglast í tónlistinni í tveimur aðskildum hlutverkum; einleiksfiðlan túlkar nálægðina en kammersveitin fjarlægðina í landslaginu."

6. May 2018, Salurinn, Kópavogur

Sceadu (2018), for Violin and Chamber Orchestra

Perspicere (2018), for Harpsichord, Violin, Viola and Violoncello
Performed by Nordic Affect // Sumartónleikar í Skálholtskirkju
Recorded by the Icelandic National Broadcasting Service.
 
Inblástur þessa verks á rætur að rekja til upplifunar á landslagi í þoku þar sem jörð og himinn virðast sameinast í eina samfellda heild. Í flutningi á þessari upplifun yfir í tónlist, skapaði ég hljóðheim með tónblæ sem þróast frá reglulegum hljóðum yfir í óregluleg og spegla þannig hin þokukenndu skil himins og jarðar. 
 
The inspiration of this work came from a view of a landscape through fog which blurred the horizon so that the land seemed to vanish into air. In my translation of the landscape to music, I focused on different layers of timbre that moved from sound to noise in order to express the undefined landforms.
 
Samið með styrk frá Tónskáldasjóði RÚV/STEFS
Composition supported by RÚV/STEF Composer's Fund

Painting by Þórunn Bára Björnsdóttir
thorunnbara.is

Perspicere (2018), for period instruments

Lendh (2018) for Orchestra
Performed by the Iceland Symphony Orchestra
Conductor: Daníel Bjarnason
Recorded by the Icelandic National Broadcasting Service.

This musical composition is an expression of what I see, hear and feel in unspoiled nature: a poetic linkage of the senses. The inspiration and guide for the work is the geothermal area in Krýsuvík. I have analysed the geologic and geographic features of the area and transformed the landscape as I perceive it into musical notation. From that abstract representation, time progression and structural events of the work evolve. 

Þetta tónverk er tjáning þess sem ég sé, heyri og upplifi í óspilltri náttúru; ljóðrænt flæði skynjunar. Innblásturinn var jarðhitasvæðið í Krýsuvík. Ég greindi jarð- og landfræðileg einkenni svæðisins og umbreytti landslaginu eins og ég skynjaði það yfir í nótnaskrift. Úr þessari grunnmynd spruttu eðlisþættir tónsmíðarinnar.

*Nominated for the Icelandic music awards 2020 - Composition of the year*
*Nominated for the Nordic Council Music Prize 2020*
________________________________________________________________
The score is available on Iceland Music Information Centre / Tónverkamiðstöð. To purchase parts, please contact itm@mic.is

The score is available on Canadian Music Center / Centre de musique canadienne. To purchase parts, please contact atelier@centremusique.ca

Lendh (2018), for Orchestra

Sciftan (2019) for Ensemble
Performed by Ensemble Dasein
Conductor: Sigurður Árni Jónsson
Recorded by Heikki Kiviaho / Scenkonst Sörmland
Supported by the Iceland Artists' Salary Fund/ Launasjóður listamanna

Sciftan is a work based on the ever-changing light over the sea and its reflection. It is the shifting between its overcast veil and its beaming glow.

The premiere of Sciftan took place on 15 August 2019 at Konsertsalen, Scenkonst Sörmland, Eskilstuna (SE)

Ensemble Dasein:
Saga Fagerström: flutes
Anton Wigh: clarinets 
Julija Morgan: violin
Natalia Goldmann: violoncello
Benjamin Sandberg: percussion
Nils Henriksson: piano
Sigurður Árni Jónsson: conductor

www.ensembledasein.com
www.facebook.com/ensembledasein

veroniquevaka.com

Sciftan (2019), for ensemble

Flowen (2020)
Veronique Vaka
Performed by Siggi String Quartet.
Kammermúsíkklúbburinn, 8. mars 2020
siggistringquartet.com

"The work Flowen is my translation of different colours and behaviour 
of the sea when covered by coastal fog;
between clarity and haze, moving towards oneness."

Supported by the Artists' salary fund.
Recorded by the Icelandic National Broadcasting Service.

Flowen f. string quartet

Blaen (2020)
Veronique Vaka
Written for Elektra Ensemble, Tónlistarhátíð Rásar 1

On the occasion of Beethoven 250th anniversary, I explored the fourth movement of the Pastoral symphony, 'Gewitter, Stum', and I extracted a selection of pitches from it that became the groundwork of ' Blaen' . I transformed the chosen material to depict my perception of a storm, with an emphasis on the stillness that occurs between two gusts.
---
Í tilefni 250 ár fæðingarafmæli Beethovens, skoðaði ég fjórða kafla Pastoral sinfóníunnar, „Gewitter, Sturm“, og valdi þaðan safn tónefnis sem varð upphafspunktur verksins „Blaen“. 

Þessu efni umbreytti ég síðan svo það félli að skynjun minni á stormi, með áherslu á kyrrðina sem myndast milli vindhvíða.

Composition supported by RÚV
Commissioned by Anna Thorvalds

Blaen (2020), f. quintet

Veronique Vaka, born in 1986, is a composer based in Iceland. She studied classical cello performance at Vincent-d’Indy, continued her studies in electro acoustic composition at the University of Montreal and completed a Master's degree in music composition from the Iceland University of the Arts. Her orchestral work Lendh has been nominated for The Icelandic Music Awards 2020 - Composition of the year, and for the Nordic Council Music Prize 2020.

"Lendh, an extraordinary canvas with an umbilical connection to the landscape of the place. […] emerging into a luminous, subtle, carefully formed and exquisitely detailed piece that floats as one ever-transforming entity, pulsating with micro-pressures and glistening details, unfolding organically with spectral-level colour-matching. Pedal notes on lur-like brass are pulled gently and microtonally out of line - the world seen at its most precarious and extreme. Lendh is a marvel.” -Gramophone Editor’s Choice

Veronique Vaka works have been performed by: The Iceland Symphony Orchestra, Sinfóníuhljómsveit Áhugamanna's Orchestra, Ensemble Paramirabo, Duo Harpverk, Ensemble Synaesthesis, Ensemble Adapter, Elektra Ensemble, Caput Ensemble, The Reykjavík Chamber Orchestra, Feima, Siggi String Quartet, Ensemble Dasein, Nordic Affect, Opus XX Orchestra, Feima, Sarah Parkin -soprano, Michael Taylor -countertenor, Una Sveinbjarnardóttir, Sæunn Thorsteinsdóttir, Þórunn Ósk Marinósdóttir and Halla Steinunn Stefánsdóttir. Veronique Vaka composed a Violin Concerto, Sceadu (2019), a Cello Concerto, Gemæltan (2020) and a Viola Concerto, Vanescere (2021). Her works have been performed during Tertulia Chamber Music (2023), Chamber Music Festival on Valentia Island (2022), Myrkir Músíkdagar/ Dark Music Days (2018-19-20-22), Tónlistarhátíð Rásar 1 (2020), Kammermúsíkklúbburinn (2020), and Sumartónleikar í Skálholti (2018). 

Among upcoming projects are INMOST, an orchestral work written for the Finnish conductor Eva Ollikainen, and NEIGE ÉTERNELLE, a series of five pieces for solo violoncello written for Sæunn Thorsteinsdóttir.

Veronique Vaka

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