Daniel Bjarnason​’s latest work, ​“Laughing Song”, commissioned and performed by the Los Angeles Children’s Chorus, premieres this week in Los Angeles. Set to the poem of the same name, it is meant as a celebration of joy and merriment, part of William Blake’s poetry collection Songs of Innocence and of Experience. This is Daniel’s second commission from the ensemble, after he wrote The Isle is full of Noises, with text from Shakespeare’s The Tempest, for the Los Angeles Children’s Chorus and American Youth Symphony in 2012.

Bjarnason’s music is regularly featured in Los Angeles. In 2017 he co-curated and presented the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra’s Reykjavik Festival and his latest orchestral work, Violin Concerto, written for Pekka Kuusisto was premiered last summer at the Hollywood Bowl with Gustavo Dudamel conducting the Los Angeles Philharmonic. His previous works commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic include Over Light Earth and Blow Bright.

On returning to Iceland, Daniel Bjarnason conducts the Icelandic premiere of his first opera, Brothers, at Harpa Hall, presented by The Icelandic Opera. Brothers premiered in summer 2017 by The Danish National Opera in Aarhus, as part of the Capital Culture events the city hosted. The production is directed by Kasper Holten, with stage design by Steffen Aarfing and libretto by Kerstin Perski.