The school's guitar ensemble took part in the Sinfonía's Christmas concert.
The Iceland Symphony Orchestra's Christmas concert took place in the Eldborg Hall at Harpa last weekend. The guitar ensemble from the Hafnarfjörður School of Music was among this year's participants; an invitation to take part in this prestigious concert is considered a great honour and the standards are high.
Christmas Concert of the Iceland Symphony Orchestra took place in the Eldborg Hall of Harpa last weekend. Guitar orchestra Hafnarfjörður Music School were among this year's participants, and an invitation to take part in these prestigious concerts is considered a great honour, as the standards for quality and talent are very high. The guitar ensemble has been practising hard in recent days, weeks and months, but the group rehearsed with the Symphony Orchestra for the first time last Thursday.
Sinfonic arrangement of the Gilsbakka Thula for guitar ensemble and the Iceland Symphony Orchestra
A guitar orchestra has been active at the Hafnarfjörður Music School for the past few years, and the orchestra usually rehearses once a week. It was about a year ago that the Iceland Symphony Orchestra contacted the school and asked for the guitar ensemble to play with them at the 2020 Sinfó Christmas concert. The reason for this invitation was that they had heard there was a strong guitar department at the school. The Hafnarfjörður Music School accepted the invitation and, a year later, the guitar ensemble took to the stage in the Eldborg Hall at Harpa. Sinfó arranged 'Gilsbakkaþula' for the guitar ensemble and the IS. The guitar group, which consists of 20 students, performed brilliantly at the weekend's concert, having expanded in the run-up to and preparation for the event. The students of the guitar orchestra are pupils of Þórarinn Sigurbergsson, Þröstur Þorbjörnsson and Svans Vilbergsson, teachers at the Hafnarfjörður School of Music.
The concert will be shown on RÚV on Christmas Eve.
The concert featured a medley of Nordic Christmas songs, along with classic song gems and favourite tunes, performed by distinguished singers, Bryndís Guðjónsdóttir, Valdimar Guðmundsson and Kolbrún Völkudóttir, together with the Reykjavík Girls' Choir and the sign language choir 'Litlu sprotunum'. Classical ballet dancers performed to the music of Tchaikovsky, and a flute choir, along with a guitar group and the Bell Choir of Reykjanesbær Music School, performed lovely festive music and rang in the Christmas season. The compère was the clown Aðalheiður. The concert was recorded for Rás 1 and will be broadcast on television by RÚV on Christmas Eve at 13:25.