Playing on ice: Special quartet returns to Leeds for one night

A winter wonderland awaits in the Howard Assembly Room on Thursday 20 November as music pioneer Terje Isungset and his quartet return to the venue for a concert performed entirely on instruments carved from ice.

The concert was conceived as a celebration of the natural world and a reminder of how important the preservation of icy regions has become. The quartet features ice harp, ice horn, iceofone and ice bass, all created using frozen water from the lakes of Norway. These ephemeral works of art produce an ethereal and beguiling sound, beautifully capturing the essence of winter and the colder months.

Terje Isungset is one of Europe’s most accomplished and innovative percussionists and a pioneer of ice instruments. He was inspired to use ice to make music after previously experimenting with wood and stone. Having discovered the evocative sound it made, he held the world’s first Ice Music concert inside a frozen waterfall in Lillehammer, Norway in February 2000: “I took the sound from underneath the waterfall, and then I hit the ice. I thought it was so beautiful. It was like falling in love.” The success of this event led to Terje teaming up with Pål Knutsson Medhus to create the world’s first Ice Music Festival in Geilo, Norway in 2006. 

Tony Green, Howard Assembly Room General Manager and Programmer said: 

“This is the only opportunity the people of Leeds will get to catch this unique performance, as it’s the quartet’s sole date in the north of England. With all the current discussion and concern around global warming and climate change, this concert is a moment for people to pause and reflect on the beauty of the natural world while listening to some of the most extraordinary and evocative music they’re likely to hear this year.”

The musicians performing on the night will be Terje Isungset on ice drums, ice percussion, ice horns and iceofone, Amalie Holt Kleive on vocals, ice percussion and water, Julie Rokseth on ice harp and Toivo Fjose on ice bass. Sound design is by Mathias Grønsdal.

Terje Isungset Ice Quartet plays at Howard Assembly Room on Thursday 20 November. Tickets are available here.