Biography (read more)
Sigvaldi Kaldalóns was an Icelandic physician and composer, born in Reykjavík in 1881, who trained in medicine in Reykjavík and Copenhagen and practiced as a doctor for most of his life while composing in his spare time. Working in a late-Romantic, lyrical idiom rather than the modernist styles of his era, he wrote roughly 350 songs setting Icelandic poetry to music, many of which are so deeply embedded in the national repertoire that they are popularly mistaken for traditional folk songs. His best-known work is the art song “Ave María,” set to a poem by Indriði Einarsson, alongside other beloved songs such as “Ísland ögrum skorið” and “Á Sprengisandi.”
Kaldalóns is regarded as Iceland’s foremost lyric song composer, and his melodies — especially “Ave María” — remain central to the Icelandic art-song and choral repertoire, performed and recorded by generations of Icelandic singers and, in modern times, reinterpreted by artists such as pianist Víkingur Ólafsson.
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