About this Artist
amiina is a band based in Reykjavík, Iceland. At present the band counts five people - Hildur Ársælsdóttir, María Huld Markan Sigfúsdóttir, Sólrún Sumarliðadóttir, Magnús Trygvason Eliassen and Guðmundur Vignir Karlsson (aka Kippi Kaninus).
The group's origins go back to the late 1990s, when four girls studying string instruments at the Reykjavík College of Music formed a string quartet. The group started out playing classical music, but increasingly moved on to play all sorts of music with various bands in Reykjavík.
In 1999 the quartet joined Icelandic band Sigur Rós on stage. The collaboration continued for over a decade, with amiina contributing strings to Sigur Rós’ music on tour and in the recording studio on the albums ( ),Takk, Með suð í eyrum við s pilum enda laust and Valtari.
In 2004, amiina’s firs t EP, AnimaminA, was released, followed by the single Seoul (2006), the full-length album Kurr (2007), a Lee Hazlewood collaboration on a 7” vinyl Hi lli (at the Top of...) (2008) and the limited release EP Re Minore (2009). In the autumn of 2007, drummer Magnús Trygvason Eliassen joined amiina on tour, adding percussion to the band’s textures. A few months later, collaboration between the electronic artist Kippi Kaninus and amiina was established while collaborating on a show for the Reykjavík Arts Festival. The merging of Kippi Kaninus' electronics and rhythms with amiina's sounds and Magnús' percussion became the starting point for more established collaboration.
amiina’s second long playing album, the much acclaimed Puzzle, was released by the band in 2010 in Iceland, getting worldwide distribution the following year. The songs on Puzzle are more rhythmically rugged than amiina's previous work and feature heavier use of electronics. amiina's long-standing fondness for zero-g melodies and open-minded instrumentation, however, continues.
The album The Lighthouse Project was released in 2013, focusing on the journey and intimate recordings of songs that the band performed in lighthouses around Iceland during the summer of 2009.
In 2009 amiina started to perform their original soundtracks to pioneering German filmmaker Lotte Reiniger's 1930's silhouette animations of the timeless fairy tales Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, Thumbelina, The Magic Horse and Aladdin. The so called Animagica program, originally performed at the Branchage film festival in Jersey, has now been widely toured around festivals in Europe, Australia and Asia.
The Fantomas project started as a commission by Yann Tiersen to make a new score for the 1913 film Juve contre Fantomas, and was premiered at an event in Paris celebrating the 100 year anniversary of the five Fantomas films. The band later decided to rework the score into an independent body of work, that is to be released in the autumn of 2016.
Alongside work with amiina, band members keep busy collaborating, recording and touring with a mix of other artist vaious musical genres, visual artists, theatre and dance, both in Iceland and elsewhere in the world.
Please visit amiina at: www.amiina.com, www.facebook.com/amiina.music/amiina, twitter.com/amiina, soundcloud.com/amiina and vimeo.com/user5378104.