Ingólfsdóttir, Thorgerdur
Ingólfsdóttir, Thorgerdur
Ingólfsdóttir, Thorgerdur, Icelandic choral conductor and teacher; b. Reykjávik, Nov. 5, 1943. She was a student at the Reykjavík Coll. of Music (teacher’s diploma, 1965), and also studied theology at the Univ. of Iceland and choral conducting and musicology with Robert Ottósson (1963–65). In 1966-67 she held a graduate fellowship at the Univ. of Ill., and then continued her studies with Ottósson in her homeland (1968–74). She also studied choral conducting in England, N.Y., Switzerland, Israel, Norway, and Vienna. In 1967 she founded the Hamrahlíd Choir in Reykjavík, which she molded into one of Iceland’s most important performing groups. She conducted it throughout Europe and in Israel and Japan. As a teacher, she served on the faculties of the Reykjavík Coll. of Music (from 1967) and of Hamrahlíd Coll. (from 1967). In 1985 the president of Iceland made her a Knight of the Order of the Falcon for her services to Icelandic music, and in 1992 the king of Norway named her a Commander of the Royal Order of Merit.
—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire