Nº47 Jónsi

Jón Þór Birgisson, better known as Jónsi, is an Icelandic musician who is best known for using a traditional cello bow on guitar. Apart from his solo career, he is the vocalist and instrumentalist for the ambient post-rock band Sigur Rós and is also known for his past partnership with Alex Somers in which they were known as Jónsi & Alex.

Jónsi’s music path started at the age of 13 when he learned his first song. He received inspiration from the popular band Iron Maiden and continues to look up to them today. Early in his career he played in a rock band called the Bee Spiders but in 1994 he formed the band Sigur Rós. Apart from occasional hiatus, Sigur Rós is still active and enjoys tremendous success worldwide.

Jónsi released his first solo album Go in 2010 in which he soon took his songs on tour around North America and Europe. This received immense success as it reached No. 23 on the Billboard 200 in later that year. In fact, he released the Go box set which featured a short film Go Quiet that featured all of the songs in the album performed in his home in Reykjavík, Iceland. It was not until 2020 that he released his second album Shiver, which is available on vinyl in the NinjaShop.

Jónsi has also written a lot of music performed in a variety of films such as How to Train Your Dragon 2, The Circle, Boy Erased, and We Bought a Zoo. The How to Train Your Dragon soundtrack includes songs by Jónsi but for the film We Bought a Zoo, Jónsi wrote the entire score.

Jónsi has worked alongside many popular musicians like Troye Sivan and Robyn.

His newest single Mold (2021) can be listened to here.

Jonsi’s official website can be accessed here. 

More articles about Nordic artists are available in our series Nordic Art Sunday