The picture is immediate. Vast glaciated vistas, patches of fog and the twilight of a land where the sun rises only once a year. Something like that. And then that soaring music that in one long tone makes all air traffic redundant for at least a month. Beneath it the rumble of shifting earth plates. Sigur Rós made another record for the first time in 10 years and the Holland Festival managed to arrange the start of the new tour. At The Concertgebouw, with an orchestra. And rising vapours in magical light.
For fans, and for people who - like me - were just really curious about this legend, it was a wonderful evening. Sigur Rós, that is dreamy music that is nowhere soporific, because more layered than the planet itself. So is the voice of Jón Þór "Jónsi" Birgisson, who is actually just a bit more heartbreaking in his androgyny, than that of Anohni, to whose associate artist-ship we owe this extremely special Holland Festival.
All great art in history, from the castrato singers, and later the countertenors in the Baroque to the fluidity of Edith Piaf to David Bowie, his bassist Gail Ann Dorsey and now so this Jónsi, explores and pushes the boundaries of what we consider masculine or feminine, and it is only in the last few years that a certain group of conservatives have been giving a hard time about it. So nice that this festival is freshening things up.
Colourful
Not to mention the orchestra accompanying Sigur Rós on this tour: The London Contemporary Orchestra. All young classical musicians, and as diverse as London itself: never seen such a fresh, hip and colourful orchestra, with such beautiful people in it, that also plays along with razor-sharp and super-enthusiastic enthusiasm.
If there is one way to interest a new generation in orchestral music, both to create and to perform or listen to, it is this combination. A delight for the eye and ear.
So while it was all hanging by a thread. The Icelandic taxman believed to have discovered some arrears during corona, a mistake he did not finally face until March this year, and the band's drummer resigned in 2018 after allegations of sexually transgressive behaviour. Now the London Contemporary's percussion department is taking over his role, which is no loss. The keyboardist who left in 2013 is also back, giving everything back the fullness you would expect from this particular stadium act.
This performance makes the Holland Festival in its 76th edition a little more special than it already was: a chance to see art that we do not and cannot make in the Netherlands.
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