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Gabriel Olafs

Polar

Universal Classics
Release Date: January 24, 2025

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Performance (Live on KEXP)
1 Entrance  
2 Whale Overture  
3 The Waves  
4 Tu´ndra  
5 The Winds  
6 The Monolith  
7 Whale Variation  
8 Vortex  
9 Ocean Sonata for Harp  
10 Elegy  
11 The True Meaning Of Forever  
12 Coda  
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Icelandic composer Gabríel Ólafs’ new album Polar is a work of speculative fiction in musical form. Polar provides the soundtrack to a frozen world. A world of towering mountain ranges, desolate tundra, forbidding oceans, and the monolithic remnants of a lost civilization.

POLAR: TRAVELER’S LOG - Story by Rebecca Roanhorse - Traveler's log:

The planet rises in the ship's viewscreen, a boundless world of whites and water-logged blues, skies the color of old frost. Atmospheric conditions amenable to life, but surface temperature hostile to carbon-based life. My readings say there is nothing alive here.

Not even you... for very long, anyway.

I am sorry, traveler, but you are doomed. We know that death comes for us all, the tragedy of our small lives intolerable. But here you are, tolerating it. I estimate your lifespan in increments – joys and sorrows, dreams and dreads reduced to mathematical calculations.
The algorithm gives you three days, maybe four before your technology fails and this frozen world claims you forever. It is a handful of hours slipping through loose fingers.

But cheer up! Death is not upon you yet. Let us see what there is to see while we still have eyes to see it, hands to touch it, skin that desires, and a tongue that tastes.

So, traveler, land this failing ship, for there is nowhere else in the universe to go. Your directive is clear, and the way back is lost to the time that has already passed to bring you this far. From here, your journey flows in a single direction: forward, as all life flows.

Until death intercedes to stop it.

This place is a kaleidoscope of restless storm-grayed ancient seas. They rock and heave with the secrets of the origins of life. Is that not what you seek, too? These secrets? They exist here in this stretch of rolling nothingness, in the echoes of aging whalesong.

Somewhere just beyond your ken. But search for them, anyway. Drift in the ebb and flow of loss and gain and loss, again. It is not so terrible, this loneliness.

  • Gabriel Olafs - Steiney Sigurardottir 'Lullabies for Piano and Cello' is exceptional / ArtisanMusicReviews.com
    Posted At: January 8, 2024
    ArtisanMusicReviews.com R J Lannan writes….Piano and cello duos are quite popular, but I think that the collaboration between Icelandic composer/pianist Gabríel Ólafs and cellist Steiney Sigurðardóttir is exceptional. Everything on the album Lullabies for Piano and Cello seems to work flawlessly. The concept of transmuting centuries old folktales and lullabies into contemporary post-classical music is very ...

  • Viking heritage inspires soothing lullabies from Icelandic pianist: Gabriel Olafs / NPR
    Posted At: June 12, 2023
    Gabríel Ólafs drew inspiration from Viking tunes for his album Lullabies for Piano and Cello, featuring cellist Steiney Sigurðardóttir.NPR - Morning Edition's Olivia Hampton writes……While strolling in his home city of Reykjavik last year, Gabríel Ólafs wandered into a bookstore, where he found an out-of-print collection of ancient Viking melodies. The Icelandic pianist-composer found inspiration to explore ...

  • Gabriel Olafs releases new album: 'Lullabies For Piano And Cello' / MARTIN CID MAGAZINE
    Posted At: June 11, 2023
    Lullabies soundtrack the most formative season of our development. For centuries, parents have hummed them to children as either a salve to ease stress, a natural aid to trigger sleep, or a simple reminder that all will be well in the world once morning comes. Imprinted upon our memories and carried within our hearts for lifetimes, we pass them from one generation to the next. Icelandic composer and artist ...

  • Gabriel Olafs set to release his new Decca Records recording: 'Lullabies for Piano and Cello'
    Posted At: April 11, 2023
    Lullabies soundtrack the most formative season of our development. For centuries, parents have hummed them to children as either a salve to ease stress, a natural aid to trigger sleep, or a simple reminder that all will be well in the world once morning comes. Imprinted upon our memories and carried within our hearts for lifetimes, we pass them from one generation to the next. Icelandic composer and artist ...
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