“The work is electrifying. It poses musical questions to explore the complex interconnection of real and artificial intelligence. The first movement is laced with dialogue between sections of the orchestra, in quiet exploration… The second movement picks up the ethereal, shivering strings in contrast with low brass… The third movement is powerful without being bombastic. Winds imitate voices. The strings climb, the brass providing contrast with low strings and keyboard.”

“Bjarnason is an eloquent conductor with a bent, you might say, for [composer Bent] Sorensen’s sensitivity. It would be hard to imagine a performance as lovely of a 6‑year-old piece that seems destined for far wider exposure.”

“[Re.Concurrence] No praise can be too high for the outstanding musicianship of all involved in this priceless album which may well end up being my disc of the year.”

“Concurrence [CD] reminds us of Daniel Bjarnason’s consummate skill as a conductor. In his capable hands, the Icelandic Symphony Orchestra triggers its own tectonic shift. This album is where to turn to hear tomorrow’s music today.”

“The Icelanders in Gävle Concert Hall lived up to the high expectations. (…) [Re. Processions] A modern masterpiece, performed with all the required feeling and sharpness. It’s just surrendering.”

“Daníel Bjarnason (…) scored a hit with his first opera, Brothers. Unlike many first operas, this modern-day version of the return of Ulysses, based on the film Brothers by Susanne Bier, is a genuinely gripping theatrical and musical experience, and it deserves a wider staging. Bjarnason’s score is remarkable in its invention and sophistication, blending influences from Tippett to Arvo Pärt, as well as the cadences of Icelandic folk music and the staccato beats of a Reykjavik club night.”

“…expect to hear much more of Bjarnason’s music over the years ahead.”

“[H]is colorful, restless score drew me in, with its passages of overlapping cyclic riffs, slowly heaving instrumental expanses and episodes of darting fragments, like some mystical dance.”

“The program opened with Mr. Bjarnason’s ​“Bow to String,” a 2009 work originally written for solo cello with multilayered electronic elements. The version played here, by members of the Philharmonic with a few guest artists, is for solo cello and nine instrumentalists. The first movement is pulsing, thick and frenetic, with aggressive, Bartok-like chords, given extra punch by a thumping piano. The second movement is like a fractured, jittery dance, at once cosmic and sensual. In the slow, subdued final movement, the elegiac solo cello is comforted by hazy, plush, pungent chords.”