The story behind the lights
Björk performed with a full orchestra, conducted by Bjarni Frímann, and wanted the sky to be part of the arrangement. So we flew in flocks, alternating through the set: an ocean wave rolling over the field in blue, a red grid tightening and releasing with the music, formations that answered each song rather than interrupting it. Everything was cued live, to the second, over two hours.
Created as Studio DRIFT, designed with TwoFiftyK, produced by Drone Stories: the longest drone sky story ever flown at a festival, and a show built to serve a musician rather than to upstage her.
In Björk’s words
After the show, Björk wrote to her audience that she had been “joined with 864 drones tonight”, and explained why: she had asked Studio DRIFT to join her because of a long fascination with digital notation, the idea of tonality made visible, and the hope that the audience would get, in her words, “slashes of synesthesia” while watching. She and creative director James Merry chose the theme for the shapes: architectural and biological movements, curves. She closed by saying she hoped they enjoyed it.
Show by Drone Stories with Studio DRIFT and TwoFiftyK · Drones by Nova Sky Stories (two different companies). Creative direction for Björk’s team: Björk and James Merry. From the Drone Stories Instagram post of 17 April 2023.
