Viennese favourites

The ISO's ever-popular Viennese concerts are truly a New Year's festival, brightening the dark winter days with zesty and vibrant music and setting an upbeat tone for the year to come. Finnish-British conductor Ross Jamie Collins takes the podium as the Orchestra performs waltzes and polkas by Johann Strauss the Younger, including the Emperor Waltz and the Blue Danube, as well as the overture to Die Fledermaus.

Two of Iceland's leading singers take the stage, joined by dancers. Jóhann Kristinsson has earned an excellent reputation as a lyric and opera singer, winning first prize in the international Stella Maris Vocal Competition in 2019 and the Jury Award from the Wiener Musikverein, where he competed on behalf of the Hamburg State Opera. Dísella Lárusdóttir has chalked up one artistic victory after another during her tenure with the Metropolitan Opera in New York. She has been praised effusively by critics, most recently in the New York Times, where she was lauded for her performance in Philip Glass' opera Akhnaten: “Penetrating and resonant … with nearly mechanical exactitude and endurance, but … expressive within the discipline.” In April 2022, Dísella and her colleagues from the Met won the Grammy award for best opera recording for their recording of Akhnaten.

The vibrancy of Viennese music is the perfect way to ring in the new year.

Singer Álfheiður Erla Guðmundsdóttir and conductor Keri-Lynn Wilson, set to perform our New Year‘s concert had to cancel due to unforeseen circumstances.