Dormant Beauty

Drone Mass is a profoundly atmospheric work, at times reminiscent of the meditative minimalism of composers such as Pärt or Górecki, and represents what Jóhannsson called “a distillation of a lot of influences and obsessions”. One of these was, as the title suggests, his fascination with the musical device of the drone. Here, his drones have a motivic-like role, shifting and shimmering with hypnotic effect, conjuring different moods, from unsettling to uplifting, as the work progresses.