Where the Glacier Meets the Sky

Where the Glacier Meets the Sky is a moving and sentimental choral piece that draws its musical inspiration from a famous poetic line found in the literary epic, Heimsljós (World Light), written by the Nobel Prize laureate of Iceland, Halldór Laxness. This once controversial novel tells the story of Ólafur Kárason, an orphan boy who longed to read all the books in the world, and aspire to write his own poetry amidst an atmosphere of socialism and communism, while plodding through his personal struggles and forging his creativity in the ruggedly beautiful landscape and indomitable culture of Iceland. While visiting Iceland I came upon this profoundly moving poem by Halldór Laxness, and I realized how symbolic it was of Iceland’s people and culture, and how the words of the poem possessed music within it, and this led me to compose this work in the hope of capturing some aspects of the wonder that is Iceland.