dalalaeda

Dalalæða’s Dysjar is an artwork that intertwines music, poetry and social history. Musically speaking, this is a gloomy approach to the form of jazz －some sort of “doom jazz”－ characterized by slow progression, mysterious atmosphere and impressionism. The sound of the traditional jazz piano trio is merged with a neoclassical texture from bass and contrabass clarinet as well as electric sounds and recordings taken from the Icelandic environment in the city and nature.

Another aspect of the project is a connection to the centuries old tradition of Icelandic poetry and rhymes, where spoken words in Icelandic are used instead of singing. This, together with the underlying jazz music, has a certain resemblance to the poetry readings of the beat poets in the fifties in the United States.

The subject of the album's lyrics was taken from Icelandic history in recent centuries, based on sources from the project “Dysjar hinna dæmdu” (Cairns of the Condemned) whose aim was to search for the individuals who were executed by laws in Iceland in the years 1550-1830.