"Waves can relate to sound waves, dance gestures, and the overall form of the piece. It is clear, yet open enough to work in different directions".  

-Hugi Guðmundsson, composer (DK/IS)

CALMUS Waves is a dance project to a new composition created in real-time. Composers Hugi Guðmundsson and Kjartan Ólafsson construct a frame, similar to an improvisation frame, in close collaboration with choreographer Kasper Ravnhøj. The performance includes dancers, Stockholm Saxaphone Quartet and pianist Tinna Thorsteinsdóttir who interactively perform the music constructed in real-time by the composers and controlled by the dancers and instrumentalists themselves. The music appears in real-time for the musicians on iPads in the form of graphical notation via the app CALMUS Notation.

CALMUS Waves was premiered at Reykjavík Art Festival 2016. It is the first production where the dance, music and lights are created on the spot in real time as well as performed by dancers, musicians, light technician and computer programmers.

The theme, Waves combines the two main artistic outputs of the project; sound and movement. The composer, Hugi Guðmundsson (DK/IS), has taken this idea a step further, and will break the artwork down into three chapters, which he calls Bára, Gára and Ára. These are Icelandic words, bára being a poetic name for a sea wave, gára the small ripple in the water when you throw a stone into a calm pond and ára means aura, the energetic waves of humans. Hugi says "Waves can relate to sound waves, dance gestures, and the overall form of the piece. It is clear, yet open enough to work in different directions".

CALMUS Waves is supported by Nordic Culture Point, Nordic Culture Fund and Iceland Ministry of Education, Science and Culture.