Egill Ólafsson (born 9 February 1953) is an Icelandic singer, songwriter, and actor. He is married to the actress,

Tinna Gunnlaugsdóttir Tinna Gunnlaugsdóttir (born 18 June 1954) is an Icelandic actress. She has appeared in twelve films since 1981. She starred in ''As in Heaven'', which was screened out of competition at the 1992 Cannes Film Festival. She is the sister of direc ...

Education

Egill Ólafsson studied playing guitar and piano when he was young and was part of a boys' brass band under the direction of Karl Otto Runólfsson. While he was a student at Hamrahlid College from 1970 until 1974, Egill Ólafsson sang in the choir of the school Kór MH. 1970 he started to study at the Tónlistarskólinn (music school in

Reykjavík Reykjavík is the Capital city, capital and largest city in Iceland. It is located in southwestern Iceland on the southern shore of Faxaflói, the Faxaflói Bay. With a latitude of 64°08′ N, the city is List of northernmost items, the worl ...

). The disciplines he was studying were singing and composing. In 1976 Egill Ólafsson graduated at Tónlistarskólinn In Reykjavík.

Professional life

Among his compositions are music for choirs, brass band music and music for strings and trumpets. He has composed around 30 theatrical works. He composed for musicals ''Grettir'', ''Eva Luna'' and ''Come Dance With Me'', the latter having a run on off-Broadway in 1996. His works have been played by various ensembles like Spilverk þjóðanna, Stuðmenn, Hinn íslenski Þursaflokkur, Tríó Björns Thoroddsen, Blái hatturinn, Les Grand Tango and The Icelandic Sound Company. And just recently (2015–16) he's been working with the German group Strom & Wasser as a co-writer and musician. The product has been released by Traumton in Berlin, called "Reykjavik" (Double Album). He has landed many stage roles in Icelandic Theatre and film roles in Icelandic, German and Scandinavian films. Under the mononym Egill he released a number of albums mainly with Stuðmenn / Spilverk þjóðanna labels. He also co-wrote materials with Finnish artist Matti Kallio, a resident of Iceland. Egill Olafsson also is a musical-performer. Several times he was performing leading characters in the Icelandic productions of different musicals at the Icelandic National Theatre, for instance ''Evita'' (Perón), ''Carmen negra'' (Escamillo), ''Three Penny Opera'' (Peachum), ''Kiss me Kate'' (Fred Graham) and also in many of the plays he has written as composer. He appeared as

Javert Javert (), no first name given in the source novel, is a fictional character and a main antagonist of Victor Hugo's 1862 novel ''Les Misérables.'' He was presumably born in 1780 and died on June 7, 1832. First a prison guard, and then a police i ...

in ''Vesalingarnir'', the Icelandic adaptation of ''

Les Misérables ''Les Misérables'' (, ) is a 19th-century French literature, French Epic (genre), epic historical fiction, historical novel by Victor Hugo, first published on 31 March 1862, that is considered one of the greatest novels of the 19th century. '' ...

'' at the National Theatre, after having played the role of

Jean Valjean Jean Valjean () is the protagonist of Victor Hugo's 1862 novel ''Les Misérables''. The story depicts the character's struggle to lead a normal life and redeem himself after serving a 19-year-long prison sentence for stealing bread to feed his ...

in the same musical a quarter of a century earlier. At Les Misérables: The Dream Cast in Concert on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the opening of the Original West End production of the musical Les Misérables Egill Ólafsson was performing as one of the Seventeen Valjeans at the second encore. It was filmed in October 1995 at the

Royal Albert Hall The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall on the northern edge of South Kensington, London, England. It has a seating capacity of 5,272. Since the hall's opening by Queen Victoria in 1871, the world's leading artists from many performance genres ...

and released on

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for digital video disc or digital versatile disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any ki ...

VHS VHS (Video Home System) is a discontinued standard for consumer-level analog video recording on tape cassettes, introduced in 1976 by JVC. It was the dominant home video format throughout the tape media period of the 1980s and 1990s. Ma ...

and

LaserDisc LaserDisc (LD) is a home video format and the first commercial optical disc storage medium. It was developed by Philips, Pioneer Corporation, Pioneer, and the movie studio MCA Inc., MCA. The format was initially marketed in the United State ...

distributed by

Sony Pictures Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc. is an American diversified multinational mass media and entertainment studio conglomerate that produces, acquires, and distributes filmed entertainment (theatrical motion pictures, television programs, and rec ...

(US/CAN) and

BBC Video 2 Entertain Video Limited, trading as BBC Studios Home Entertainment, is a British video and music publisher founded in 2004 following the merger of BBC Video and Video Collection International by BBC Worldwide and the Woolworths (United Kingd ...

(UK).

Personal life

He is married to the actress and former artistic director at the National Theatre in Iceland (2005-2015)

. Their children are

Ólafur Egilsson Ólafur Egilsson (1564 – 1 March 1639) was an Icelandic Lutheran minister. In 1627, he was abducted, along with his wife and two sons, by Barbary Pirates under the Ottoman Empire during their raid on Vestmannaeyjar. The raid is known in I ...

, actor, director and writer and Gunnlaugur Egilsson, ballet dancer and Ellen Erla Egilsdóttir. Before the Icelandic loan guarantees referendum, 2010 Egill Ólafsson was one of the Icelandic celebrities, who spoke out to vote "no". At the elections for the Icelandic parliament

Althing The (; ), anglicised as Althingi or Althing, is the Parliamentary sovereignty, supreme Parliament, national parliament of Iceland. It is the oldest surviving parliament in the world. The Althing was founded in 930 at ('Thing (assembly), thing ...

in April 2013, Egill Ólafsson was a candidate of Lýðræðisvaktin (

Iceland Democratic Party Iceland Democratic Party () was a political party in Iceland, founded 16 February 2013. It was founded with the primary goal of passing the new constitution formulated by the constitutional assembly appointed by parliament in 2011.Falcon Order Medal.
Information at "Iceland Review On Line" In October 2022, it was revealed that Egill had been diagnosed with

Parkinson's disease Parkinson's disease (PD), or simply Parkinson's, is a neurodegenerative disease primarily of the central nervous system, affecting both motor system, motor and non-motor systems. Symptoms typically develop gradually and non-motor issues become ...

Work

Discography

Albums

*1991: ''Tifa tifa'' *1992: ''Blátt blátt'' *2001: ''Angelus Novus / Nýr engill'' *2003: ''Brot...Músík úr leikhúsinu'' *2006: ''Miskunn dalfiska'' *2007: ''Hymnalög'' *2012: ''Vetur'' *2013: ''Örlög mín'' *2018: ''Fjall''

Singles

*2013: "Ekkert þras" (with

Moses Hightower Moses Hightower is an Icelandic soul band based out of Reykjavík, formed in 2007 by guitarist Daníel Friðrik Böðvarsson, drummer Magnús Trygvason Eliassen, bassist & lead singer Andri Ólafsson, and keyboard player & lead singer Steingrí ...

Lay Low Lovísa Elísabet Sigrúnardóttir (born 10 September 1982), better known by her stage name, Lay Low, is an Icelandic musician and singer. Biography Lovísa was born to a Sri Lankan father and an Icelandic mother. She moved to Iceland at a ...

and Högni Egilsson)

Filmography

Compositions

(Music composed for theatre) *''The City Of Crooks'' 1976 The Theatre School Of Iceland *''The Beginners'' 1977 The National Theatre of Iceland *''Mr. Klemensson'' 1978 (Ballet) NT (Icel) *''The Cheery´s On The North - Mountain'' (Kabuki – Play) 1979 NT (Icel) /Det Norske Teater *''The Saga Of Grettir'' 1980 City Theatre in Iceland *''Schocklate For Silja'' 1982 NT (Icel) *''Ich tanze mit dir'' (Ballet) NT (Icel) 1987 *''The Steamship'' 1990 / The Theatre School Of Iceland *''Platanov'' 1992 City Theatre in Reykjavík/Malmö Statsteater *''Uncle Vanja'' 1992 City Theatre in Reykjavík *''Eva Luna (The Musical)'' 1994 (The Musical) City Theatre in Reykjavík *''Tears And Endearment'' (original Icelandic title: ''Þrek og tár'') 1995 NT (Icel) *''As You Like It'' 1996 NT (Icel) *''Come Dance With Me'' 1997 Cernucini Teatre (Off – BRDW) *''Mice And Man'' Loftkastalinn 1998 *''Anna Karenina'' NT (Icel.) 1999 *''Day Of Hope'' City Theatre in Reykjavík 2006 *''Four Jews On Parnassus'' Neue Nationalgalerie Berlin - 3 November 2008''FOUR JEWS ON PARNASSUS — A CONVERSATION'' by arl Djerassi - Performance Schedule:
in English) *''Viva la Vida/Frida Kahló'' NT (Icel) 2009 *''The Women Of The Parlament'' NT (Icel) 2013

References

External links

Official website
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Olafsson, Egill Egill Olafsson Egill Olafsson Egill Olafsson Egill Olafsson Egill Olafsson 1953 births Living people