Folk Music of Iceland

The Iceland music has a very long tradition, with some songs still sung today tracing from the 14^th century. Folk songs are often about love, masculinity, sailors, hard winters, as well as elves, trolls and other mythological creatures, and tend to be quite secular and often entertaining. Bjarni Porsteinsson collected Icelandic folk music between the year 1906 to1909, and of the songs he encountered was followed by traditional instruments such as the viola and langspil, which are among the few musical instruments that are traditionally played in Iceland. Chain dances, called vikivaki, have been performed in Iceland since the 11^th century at a variety of activities, like in the churches and during the Christmas season. An instance is Olafur Liljuros an Iceland vikivaki traditional song tracing to the 14^th century, about a man on his way to meet his mother who is seduced, kissed and stabbed by an elf woman while riding his horse, then eventually dies.

source of picture: www.iceland.is

Iceland’s isolation meant that, until the 19^th century, international influences were virtually absent, which resulted in the maintenance of a particular rhythm known as hakveoa, lost in other Nordic countries and measured one of the main characteristics of the Icelandic folk music.

Hakveoa means to a unique emphasis placed on some of the words of a song, often the last word of each sentence in each verse. In the following instance taken from the song Olafur Liljuros, hakveoa is shown in Italics; Olafur reid meo bjorgunum fram, villir Hann, stillir "Hann, hitti hann fyrir ser alfarann, þar rauoi loginn brann, Blídan lagði byrinn undan bjorgunum, blídan lagdi byrinn undan bjorgunum fram.

Rimur are epic tales sung as alliterative rhyming ballads, usually a cappella, Rimur can be traced back to the Viking Age Eddic poetry of the skalds and employs difficult metaphors and cryptic rhymes and forms. Some of the most popular rimur were written between the 18^th and the early 20^th century, by poets such as Hannes Bjarnason from 1776 to 1838, Jon Sigurdsson from 1853 to 1922 and Sigurdur Breidfjord from 1798 to 1846. In the 18^th century, European dances such as waltz, reel, polka, and schottische start to arrive via Denmark. These foreign dances are presently called gomlu dansarnir or literally the old dances. After their arrival, indigenous dance and song traditions fell into serious change.

For long time, rimur were officially stopped by the Christian church, however they remained famous until the early 20^th century. In the current year, efforts have been made to restore the indigenous Icelandic forms. For instance, a recent restoration of the rimur tradition started in the year 1929 with the formation of the organization Idunn.

Protestantism has also left its mark on the music of Iceland. Hallgrimur Petursson wrote many protestant hymns in the 17^th century. In the 19^th century, Magnus Stephensen brought the pipe organs to Iceland, to be accompanied by the harmonium pumped reed-organs. Heyr himna smidur (Hark, Creator of the heaven) is possibly the oldest psalm which is still sung today; it was composed by Kolbeinn Tumason in 1208.