Viktor’s Deutsche Grammophon debut album Poems is conceived and co-written with soprano and visual artist Álfheiður Erla Guðmundsdóttir. The album’s ten exquisite tracks draw on the pair’s shared cultural heritage, setting poems by Icelandic poets past and present, as well as lyrics by Árnason and Guðmundsdóttir themselves.

Following it’s surprise digital release, Sigur Rós’ first new studio album in ten years, ÁTTA, is their most intimate and emotionally direct record to date.

It's hard to accuse Björk of making music influenced by commercial or critical expectations at any point in her career, but her post-Homogenic work is even more focused on following her bliss, whether that means acting and singing in Lars Von Trier's grim musical Dancer in the Dark; crafting tiptoeing laptop lullabies on Vespertine; or, in the case of Medúlla, sculpting an album out of almost nothing but singing and vocal samples. The album's title and concept refer to the purest essence of something, and Medúlla explores both the ritual power of the human voice and some of the most essential themes of Björk's music in a way that's both primal and elaborate. It took a large cast of characters to make the album's seemingly organic sound, including vocalists ranging from Icelandic and British choirs to Inuit singers to Mike Patton and Robert Wyatt…

Sólstafir music penetrates the mind, body, and soul. One does not need to speak their Icelandic tongue to understand the spectrum of raw emotion evoked by every song. "Endless Twilight of Codependent Love" further solidifies the Icelandic rock giants’ place as masters of their craft, delivering their signature elegance and unbridled passion upon which they've built their career. While a clear evolution, Sólstafir also pays homage to their metallic roots. Much like the vast expanse of their homeland, the band once again embodies the ever-turning wheel of the four seasons with their shifting light and darkness.

Icelandic post-metal legends Sólstafir are now re-issuing their long out of print sophomore album, "Masterpiece of Bitterness". The 2005 full-length marked a turning point for the Icelandic icons. This release signifies the moment that Sólstafir started to embrace progressive and post metal elements, thus laying the blueprint for their definitive sound as fans know it today.

SÓLSTAFIR are not like any other band. Their sixth album 'Berdreyminn' underscores this statement. As its title "a dreamer of forthcoming events" aptly describes, the four Icelanders have taken their already impressive evolution one step further. The band has continued to amalgamate haunting melodies, psychedelic phases, as well as strong undercurrents of classic rock and hard rock with echoes of their metal past. Yet SÓLSTAFIR's focus is not on style but pure emotion. 'Berdreyminn' is eclectic by a conscious choice to make feelings audible and transform taste as well as texture to sound. Genre borders are not broken but simply ignored. Musical influences are gathered from a wide range of sources, re-arranged, and woven into new patterns. Melancholy, longing, anger, joy, pleasure, pain, and other emotions are fuelling & fulling this album.

Icelandic rock heathens Solstafir return with the stunning album 'Ótta'. The follow-up 2011's epic double album 'Svartir Sandar', 'Ótta' is a powerful and moving statement of intent that burns with the beauty of an aurora. Stellar new tracks like "Nón", "Dagmál", "Miðdegi", and "Ótta" shows Solstafir at the height of their powers, and unfold with patience and purpose in equal measure. With 'Ótta' this extraordinary quartet have crafted a riveting album that is at once familiar, ancient, and timeless.

Iceland's Solstafir's fourth album, "Snartir Sandar," is so epic that it had to be spread across two CD's. Formed in 1994, these Vikings Pagan ways evolved into a widely psychedelic and eerily rocking sound. This Season of Mist debut is both hotter than the magma and darker than the volcanic ash their homeland was formed out of. What Sólstafir have released is a not-very-small LP filled to the brim with Shoegaze, Post-Rock, Atmospheric Sludge Metal and some hints of Progressive and Alternative Rock. Despite borrowing from some seriously overdone genres (at least at the time of release), there's something about this album that's unique without really inventing anything different. Simply put, they have drawn from their influences well enough to create music that sounds like they aren't blatant rip-offs of contemporary artists.

With Meditatio I released in 2016, the Schola Cantorum Reykjavicensis and Hörður Áskelsson presented music commemorating the departed. Recorded some six years later, Meditatio II similarly contains compositions that interpret man’s thoughts and feelings about death, and celebrate the immobility and beauty found in age-old church texts such as Ave verum corpus, In paradisum, Lux æterna and Agnus Dei. With one exception, the fifteen works for mixed a cappella choir – none longer than 6 minutes – were written in the 21st century, and they originate in America and Europe. Seven Icelandic composers are represented, five of them from current or former members of the Schola Cantorum. Peaceful rather than desolate, these refined miniatures unfold over slow rhythms, coated with nuances that rarely go beyond the mezzo forte. This disc also includes an impressive arrangement of ‘Sofðu unga ástin min’, a traditional and bittersweet Icelandic lullaby, here sung without words.

Counter-tenor Franco Fagioli makes his Pentatone debut with Anime Immortali, together with the Kammerorchester Basel, exploring the music that Mozart composed for castratos. Ranging from opera to sacred music and culminating in Exsultate, jubilate, the recorded works share a sublime and profound character, demonstrating Mozart’s strong connection to the castrato voice. With this album, Fagioli finally returns to the composer that inflamed his desire to become a musician during his youth.

One of the highest regarded progressive symphonic bands from Iceland. Their career started in 1971, and lasted till 1978. In that time they only managed to release two albums, 1976's "Spelgun" and 1977's "Hríslan Og Straumurinn". They have a predominantly symphonic style, with elements of rock, blues, jazz, and even a bit of funk. Very much in the school of their '70's contemporaries, but infused with the essence of Iceland. Their closest relative would probably be Finland's Wigwam. Other influences are the usual suspects, Yes, Camel, and some Kansas.

Icelandic music of the last half century is the focus of this recording by the Choir of Clare College, Cambridge, led by its conductor, Graham Ross. Born from his close collaboration with the native composers of the “Land of Fire and Ice,” this programme sets out to explore and highlight their hypnotic soundworld, instinctively leaning towards contemplation. A prime example is the touchingly beautiful Requiem by Sigurður Sævarsson, which here receives its world premiere recording.

"Enargeia" is an ancient Greek word meaning extreme vividness, the evocation of a visual scene. It's a bit hard to see how this applies in more than a general way to the program on mezzo-soprano Emily D'Angelo. She writes: "Each piece is part of a sonic journey, each track born out of the previous one as the listener is guided through a progression, a cohesive and exploratory listening experience." This being so, one wonders why the track ordering is different in the physical and at least some online presentations of the album, but these are minor complaints.

The album 'Odin’s Raven Magic' is an orchestral collaboration between Sigur Rós, Hilmar Örn Hilmarsson, Steindór Andersen and Maria Huld Markan Sigfúsdóttir which premiered 18 years ago at the Barbican Centre in London and is now finally almost two decades later being released. The performance honours the poem, dramatic and beautiful, classical and contemporary. A stone marimba was built especially for the performance by Páll Guðmundsson.