Alice Sara Ott records Jóhann Jóhannsson piano works

German pianist Alice Sara Ott has released an album of works by the late Icelandic composer Jóhann Jóhannsson, mbl.is reports. Jóhann Jóhannsson: Piano Works is the first album to feature solo piano arrangements of some of his best-known compositions.

The recordings were made in Reykjavík in 2024. Ott worked with several people who had previously collaborated with Jóhannsson, including producer Bergur Þórisson.

Ott said she first became consciously aware of Jóhannsson’s music while watching the film The Arrival, and later heard more of it in The Theory of Everything.

Although she never met Jóhannsson, who died in 2018, Ott is signed to the same German record label, Deutsche Grammophon. She said she admired how his music strengthened the visual elements of films.

Arranged for solo piano

Ott said the Deutsche Grammophon team contacted her about a new piano book containing arrangements of several of Jóhannsson’s works. The pieces had originally been written for larger ensembles. Faber Music published the book in 2023 under the same title as Ott’s album.

She requested the sheet music, played through it at home and considered whether she could convey something through the music. She was impressed by the arrangements and decided to record them.

Ott said it was special to work with people who could share stories about Jóhannsson while making the album. However, she believes that everything a performer needs to understand in a musical work can be found in the score.

She is accustomed to playing music written by composers who died 200 or 300 years ago and to finding their messages in the works themselves. At the same time, she said, meeting people who could share stories about Jóhannsson helped confirm some of her ideas about his music and gave her a better understanding of its wider context.

An extensive interview with Ott appears in Morgunblaðið’s Sunday edition. She also performs Be Over, composed by Jóhannsson and Jonas Colstrup for the film The Shadow Play.