Icelandic musician Gyða Valtýsdóttir has won the Nordic Council Music Prize. The prize was awarded by conductor and former winner of the prize Susanna Mälkki at an awards ceremony at the Stockholm Concert Hall, which was broadcast live yesterday evening.
Gyða entered the spotlight in the late 90s as a member of experimental pop group múm. She later left the band to study classical cello and has since built a diverse and vibrant solo career as a performer and composer.
“Gyða’s music and performance is highly unique and captivating, demonstrating a special sense of phrasing and timing,” the statement from the jury reads. “Gyða crosses and bridges the gap between musical genres in a unique way, not least by dismissing any notion of their differences. Whether performing her own music or the music of others she brings her personal originality to the music through her instrumental inventiveness.”
In an interview with Iceland Review, Gyða stated “I think we all have multiple personalities and that’s a good thing. And instead of trying to put it all together and say ‘This is who I am’ because that’s the loudest voice and the other ones are quieter, you can allow yourself to have different sides and nurture all of them, even if they’re very contradictory.”
The Nordic Council Music Prize is awarded on alternate years to a work by a living composer in one year and to an ensemble or artist the next. The prize is open to artists from Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Iceland, Finland, Greenland, the Faroe Islands, and the Åland Islands.
