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Mount A
(12T030 - 2006)

Hildur Ingveldardóttir Guðnadóttir is a classically trained cellist. She began studying cello playing at the Reykjavík Music Academy and then moved on to musical studies/composition and new media at the Iceland Academy of the Arts and Universitat der Kunste in Berlin.

Hildur has been around in the core of the neu-icelandic music scene for the past years, and is a prominent figure within the group. She has worked with various artists such as Skúli Sverrisson, Pan Sonic, Jóhann Jóhannsson, Schneider TM, Angel, Stilluppsteypa, BJ Nilsen, Valgeir Sigurdsson, and Throbbing Gristle, and she is also a member of Múm as well as Nix Noltes Big Band, which plays a great blend of Bulgarian and Balkan music, with some 'sonically dirty spices' as one once put it.

These spices must be doing her some good, for she's very active on any side; she's composed quite a lot for various instrumental arrangements, made music for film, theatre and dance projects, played around with electronica as well as making sound-installations and sound-related happenings. She lately composed and performed the music for 'Sumardagur' ('Summerday') a play which premiered at the National Theatre of Iceland and a dance/music project with fellow artist Halla Ólafsdóttir for 'Nordic Music days' in 2006.

In september 2006, 12 Tónar released Hildur's first solo album, 'Mount A' under the artist name of 'Lost in Hildurness'. The album was recorded in New York City, and at Hólar in Hjaltadalur, (the former resident of the Icelandic Bishop in the medievals), in a house called Auðunarstofa - a replicant of a building which stood there on the very same spot few hundred years back. The house is all made of norwegian wood (also the nails!) and is therefore greatly suited for cello playing, concerning the outcome of the sound. The record was then mixed at The Greenhouse in Reykjavík, with Valgeir Sigurðsson in the cockpit, and mastered in Berlin. Hildur is certainly a multi-talent which crystallizes in the fact that she played all the instruments on the record by her self, including Vibraphone, Viola da Gamba, Harp...and the oldest and purest instrument of all; her voice.

Press:

"Hildur Gudnadóttir bidrager med smukke strygerstykker på múms album. Den islandske cellist og komponist, der har spillet med Gud og hvermand på folktronicascenen, er imidlertid også aktuel på egen hånd med de ru, stoflige og roligt snurrende værker for cello og atmosfære på debutalbummet Lost In Hildurness.

Gudnadóttir indlogerede sig i en ensomt beliggende hytte langt mod nord og indspillede her stigende, faldende og krydsende melodier, der udover at lokke dragende naturbilleder frem også synker ned i dybereliggende psykologiske lag.

Numrene afvikles med stor tålmodighed og sans for suspense. Der er en til tider foruroligende ro over musikkens skælvende overblændinger og hemmelighedsfulde melodier. Hildur Gudnadóttirs nærstudier af musikkens små forskydninger, rugende buestrøg og aflæsninger af sindsstemninger i den nedre halvdel af humørskalaen er ambient og minimalisme med smuk, smuk sørgerand og efterglød." Per Reinholdt Nielsen, Weekendavisen ´07