NEWS

– OCTOBER 2025 –
Summer and fall performances

The past few months have meant back-to-back productions for me – all of them fun and rewarding.

In July, I traveled with Alexander Ekman and the Paris Opera Ballet to Tokyo for five performance of Play. The whole ballet company and our Play musicians came along, including singers Callie Day and Karmesha Peake. The performances sold out and the Japanese audience let loose in a wonderful way.

Right after that I went to Scotland with Michael P. Atkinson to join choreographer Sophie LaPlane, director James Bonas, and the Scottish Ballet as we put Mary – Queen of Scots on the big Festival Theater Stage of the International Edinburgh Festival for an August 15 premiere. This is a score that Michael P. Atkinson and I wrote together for the Scottish Ballet Orchestra and electronics. My good friend Charlotta Öfverholm guested as Queen Elisabeth. A sold out run and a tour across Scotland followed. You can read more about the show on the Mary, Queen of Scots page.

I then traveled to Stockholm, where singer and composer Anna von Hausswolff and I joined the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Swedish Radio Choir to premiere a new piece that Anna and I wrote together – Grand Guignol – on August 29. The orchestra and choir performed with electronics in 12 channel surround sound mixed by me and live electronics programmed by Jocki Lövmark. Orchestration by Michael P. Atkinson and me. We were helped beautifully by everyone in the house to make the concert happen, including of course Artistic Director Matthieu Lescure. Christoph Koncz conducted the program, with Anna singing in some of the movements of Grand Guignol. The concert included Debussy’s Nocturnes and Scriabin’s Poème de L’Éxtase, and a collection of electronic pieces in surround sound by living Swedish composers. This is not the last you’ll hear of Grand Guignol.

A week later the Royal Swedish Opera Ballet brought back Alexander Ekman’s Midsummer Night’s Dream for 11 more sold out performances at the Royal Swedish Opera. Vocalist was Hannah Tolf.

Johnny Taranto‘s short film “More Money”, starring Nastasia Koulich and George Olesky, with a score by me, premiered at the Santa Fe International Film Festival on October 18, and will go to the South Africa Indie Film Fest next.

Unga Klara, a theater company in Stockholm, brought back Romeo and Julia from 2023 for a number of performances on Sergels Torg in Stockholm. Directed by Gustav Deinoff with choreography by Mari Carrasco. Music by me.

Mari Carrasco’s new piece for the Gothenburg Opera Dance Company – Little Concert – is on tour across southern Sweden this fall. The set and costumes were designed by Jenny Nordberg, with lighting design by Jenny Wijk. Music by me.

Sol Invictus keeps touring with the Hervé Koubi Dance Company across the world. I have contributed music to that score.

Now I’m at an artist residency in Umbria, Italy, called Civitella Ranieri, where I’m focusing on some new projects while getting to know a really wonderful group of artists (other fellows at the residency). It’s a magical, deeply inspiring place, and we are being hosted by a warm, thoughtful, incredibly charming team of people who run the place. The sun is shining on me through the windows of a medieval castle as I type this. I’m trying a lot of new things musically – some of which will end up in these new pieces I’m writing.

– FEBRUARY 2025 –
New Album – The music from Alexander Ekman’s HAMMER

This is the music I wrote for Alexander Ekman’s piece Hammer for the Gothenburg Opera Dance company, which premiered in the fall of 2022. We recorded the string section from the GöteborgsOperans Orkester, which Lars Kvensler conducted and Joachim Bohäll recorded at the opera house. The strings are featured on all tracks except “Want”.

Hammer is Alexander Ekman’s commentary on self-absorption, generosity and greed in a culture where exposure is a currency. As usual I worked closely with Alexander in writing the music. He even played some of the synth parts recorded off my Moog One. I play piano and synths. My strings arrangements were edited by Michael P. Atkinson. The album is available on all streaming platforms and if you prefer to buy it for file download, it’s available to buy from Apple Music. Please contact me if you want to license the music.

Music, mix and master by Mikael Karlsson
Album cover photo by Victor G. Jeffreys II
Album cover design by Johnny Taranto

Rough State Sound, 2025.

mikaelkarlsson · Hammer

– JANUARY 2025 –
Returning home

I’m back in NYC to start new projects, but what lingers with me is the astonishingly warm reception FANNY AND ALEXANDER received at La Monnaie / De Munt in Brussels in December. All shows sold out immediately after the premiere. Leading Flemish newspaper De Standaard named it the best show of the year. We received glowing reviews from Die Welt, Oper! Magazin, Dagens Nyheter and L’Echo and many many more, along with a big preview article in The New York Times, by Joshua Barone. The opera has now been added to my WORKS/OPERA section on this website, where you can see the YouTube video capture of the whole show until early February.

Just like you couldn’t get a ticket to FANNY AND ALEXANDER, all 23 shows of Alexander Ekman’s PLAY sold out months ahead of its third run at the Paris Opera Garnier.

TITTA EN ÄLG has gone way past its intended run at the Swedish Royal Dramatic Theater, due to popular demand, and FOREVER finished a great run at the Royal Swedish Opera. Anne Sofie von Otter was absolutely spellbinding in the four performances in Copenhagen and Stockholm of the orchestral song cycle So We Will Vanish.

Thank you to the over 100,000 persons who came to see shows that I wrote the music for in 2024. I’m so very grateful to you, and of course to all the people I have had the pleasure of working with.

Now I’m back home, and I will stay here until the summer to write new pieces, and to mix albums of music that hasn’t been released yet. First out is the music to Alexander Ekman’s HAMMER. The mix is nearly done, and I will release it as soon as I can.

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NYTimes about The Echo Drift

“Directed by Mallory Catlett and conducted by Nicholas DeMaison in its world premiere at the Prototype Festival, the production puts music, by Mikael Karlsson, on an equal footing with design, seeking multidimensionality on both fronts. Stark and intricate, propulsive and a little film-noir, “The Echo Drift” is most exciting when it is fast and cacophonous, nearly overwhelming the senses.”

Laura Collins-Hughes, The New York Times (The Echo Drift, PROTOTYPE Festival 2018, Baruch Performing Arts Center)

Observer about The Echo Drift

“Everything about this presentation was virtuoso, from the psychedelic snarls and slithers in composer Mikael Karlsson’s orchestra writing to the sly, ironic whispers of actor John Kelly as the Moth. But the heart of the piece was the bravura singing of Blythe Gaissert as the panicky prisoner, her smoky mezzo biting into the wide-ranging and relentless vocal part with the violent abandon of a starving shark.“

James Jorden, Observer (The Echo Drift, PROTOTYPE Festival 2018, Baruch Performing Arts Center)

Trespassing review by Dagens Nyheter

“Mikael Karlsson embodies the composer of the future“

Johanna Paulsson, Dagens Nyheter (Trespassing, Orionteatern, Stockholm, Sweden 2019)

AAoAAL

“Mikael Karlsson, born in Sweden, composes highly evocative music that sparkles, dances and sings. From powerful solo works such as Nasty Fucker, for Claire Chase, to full evening ballet, A Swan Lake for the Norwegian National Ballet, he captures the listener’s attention in every magical moment he creates. Always surprising, enchanting and forward looking in invention, his music resembles no other. Karlsson is a composer in great demand!”

– American Academy of Arts and Letters (citation: Wladimir and Rhoda Lakond Award in Music for an exceptional mid-career composer)

Dance Europe

“With so much happening on the stage it would have been easy for the music to get lost. Mikael Karlsson’s brilliant score, however, meant there was no chance of that. Act I was a wonderful orchestral remix of the greatest hits from Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake – the tunes were easily identifiable but tempi were changed, melodies chopped up and moods subtly distorted. In Act II Karlsson’s entirely original music was at first darkly cinematic before skipping into an off-kilter vaudevillian feel and then concluding with a beautifully elegiac piece that echoed Tchaikovsky’s famous white swan theme.”

– Gerard Davis, Dance Europe (review: Alexander Ekman’s full evening ballet “A Swan Lake” at the Norwegian National Ballet

Blanc Ilona Landgraf

“Mikael Karlsson, commissioned with additional composition, contributed darker music with a real edge.” … “As usual, what rose from the pit aroused true pleasure.”

Ilona Landgraf, “Landgraf on Dance”, Review of Daniel Proietto’s “Blanc” at the Vienna State Opera, premiered Nov 1 2016

Tulle review Chicago Sun Times

“…a terrific manipulated score by Mikael Karlsson…”

– Hedy Weiss, Chicago Sun Times (review: Joffrey Ballet US premiere of Alexander Ekman’s “Tulle”

Tulle review 4dancers.org

“The marvelous soundtrack by Mikael Karlsson is varied, and includes counting, heavy breathing, stomping and more fun/funny sounds punctuating a variety of “scenes” throughout the piece.”

– Catherine L. Tully, 4dancers.org (review: Joffrey Ballet’s US premiere of Alexander Ekman’s “Tulle”

Midsummer Night’s Dream, review - Dansportalen

“Mikael Karlsson’s music is a gift to dance: it is incantatory, melodic and always engaging. He mixes electronic and instrumental sounds with folk melodies in a seamless flow.”
“Mikael Karlsson, Ekman’s longtime collaborator, has delivered a score worthy of big dreams”

– Maggie Foyer, Dansportalen (Scandinavia’s largest website for dance) (review: Alexander Ekman’s “Midsummer Night’s Dream” at the Royal Swedish Ballet – world premiere April 17 2015)

Midsummer Night’s Dream review - Per Sinding-Larsen

“One of the best things I have ever seen. Thank you Mikael Karlsson for the best possible music, Anna Von Hausswolff for incredible singing and Alexander Ekman for unbeatable choreography and stage design. Thank you all incredible dancers and musicians, and thank you to the Royal Swedish Opera for presenting this show.”

Per Sinding-Larsen (leading Swedish music journalist, Instagram – Alexander Ekman’s Midsummer Night’s Dream)

Midsummer Night’s Dream review - Jan Gradvall

“Regardless of what your interests may be, drop everything and go see Midsummer Night’s Dream. I have attended concerts and art performances all over the world for 35 years and this is one of the biggest stage performance experiences of my life, on par with Kraftwerk at Solnahallen and Robert Wilson’s ‘A Dream Play’. Anna von Hausswolf is the show’s singer. Wonderful music by Mikael Karlsson who at times reminds me of David Sylvian and Michael Nyman. Mind-blowing choreography and stage design by Alexander Ekman, featuring, among other things, many tons of hay on stage.”

Jan Gradvall (Leading Swedish music journalist) Instagram – Alexander Ekman’s Midsummer Night’s Dream, Royal Swedish Ballet, world premiere April 17 2015)

Cow review, Bachtrack

“Mikael Karlsson’s original score peaked the senses and ran a whole gamut of expression, even bringing sustained energy and humor to the choir of distorted “moos”. My only reservation about the music was that there wasn’t more of it; some segments had only the barest of accompaniment. The Steve Reich influence and Romantic quotations were palpable, but even more pervasive were the stardust and muscular beats of Karlsson’s own personal hand.”

Sarah Bachelet, Backtrack – Alexander Ekman’s COW, Semperoper Ballet, world premiere March 13 2016

ÖP reviews Black Forest

“The wonderful music by Mikael Karlsson makes sure to engage one’s imagination and inner rhythm. The audience members bobbed their heads to a rhythmic percussion section.”

Martin Johansson, Östersundsposten, “Black Forest” by Mari Carrasco, April 14 2016

Rooms - Seeing dance, Maggie Foyer

“Mikael Karlsson’s music links it all together in a magical web of sounds played by strings on a platform in front and a posse of pianos in the rear and in between, there we are, a crowd of bewitched and bewildered punters, who have been allowed into the playground to wander round and gawp.”

Maggie Foyer, seeingdance.com (Rooms, Alexander Ekman, Norwegian National Ballet, Oslo Opera)

Play review by Chronik

“The music, composed by Mikael Karlsson, is essential in this ballet. It is a superb saxophone quartet (soprano, alto, tenor, baritone) that enters the stage, the first, to introduce the dance.

It is then an orchestra and a gospel singer overhanging the stage, as on the mezzanine of a loft, for the two hours of the show. It is always nice, in a contemporary ballet, to enjoy live music.

Square and cubic or round like a balloon, such is the dance of Ekman, like the music of Karlsson which alternates sequences of percussions and strolls on the piano, but also long tutti in legato with the strings and the winds. An echo of choreographies and sets, more than a synesthesia.”

Marie-Cecile Naves, chronic.fr (Play, Alexander Ekman, Paris Opera Ballet, Paris Opera)

Background video by Niklas Alexandersson.