Attendance to domestic concerts of the Iceland Symphony Orchestra and the North Iceland Symphony Orchestra totalled 79 thousand last year. That is equivalent to around a quarter of the country’s population attending a symphonic concert last year. Attendance to concerts of the Iceland Symphony Orchestra was roughly 76,000 compared to about 2,600 to concerts of the North Iceland Symphony Orchestra. The number of guests to domestic concerts of the Iceland Symphony Orchestra has increased significantly in recent years. Attendance to concerts of the orchestra within the country had in last year increased about two thirds since in the year 2009. Prior to that time the number of concert guests had remained more or less stable for many years. Yearly attendance to concerts of the North Iceland Symphony Orchestra has mostly been constant since in the mid-1990s, or between 2,500 and 3,000 guests (see figure 1).
The sudden increase in attendance to concerts of the Iceland Symphony Orchestra in more recent years can to a large extent be explained to the opening of the concert and conference house Harpa in spring 2011 where the orchestra is housed and more than doubling of available seats for concert guests. Similar change in attendance to concerts of the North Iceland Symphony Orchestra has not occurred with the opening of the Culture House Hof in summer 2011. The obvious reason is due to the fact that the orchestra is only semi-professional and to much more limited reachable population the northern part of the country compared to the much larger market of the Iceland Symphony Orchestra in the capital region in the Southwest, where some 65 per cent of the country’s population resides.
In last year, nearly 240 thousand guests attended concerts in the three concert houses operating in Iceland. That is equivalent to seven of every ten individuals attending a concert in any of the three houses (see Figure 2).
The number of concert guests has multiplied with the increased number of concert houses, from one in 2009 to three in 2011. Of nearly 240,000 concert guests in these three houses last year, guests to Harpa were nearly 200 thousand, or eight of every ten guests.
About the data
Statistics Iceland annually collects information about concerts from symphonic orchestras and music halls.