Denmark is a small country, and the same can be said about its capital city, Copenhagen. Its modest size, however, doesn’t reflect much in either the quantity or quality of its experimental and independent music scenes. Maybe the fact that the city isn’t bigger, that everyone knows each other, and that its different “scenes” have become more and more entangled over time, has actually had a positive impact on the state of the new music coming out of Copenhagen over the years?
Well, you can only wonder. But it’s safe to say that the town has gained a fair amount of international recognition due to a diverse field of contemporary artists, such as Iceage, Croatian Amor, Puce Mary, Lust For Youth, and more recently the likes of ML Buch, Erika De Casier, Clarissa Connelly, Molina, and Astrid Sonne.
Surely, all of these artists unquestionably deserve the critical recognition and exposure they've received! However, the Copenhagen music scene amounts to so much more, and if one digs a bit deeper into what's been going on, they will find artists challenging aesthetic and stylistic conventions within the context of many different genres, with many exciting releases coming out every year.
At Passive/Aggressive, a non-profit independent music media outlet with a strong focus on new experimental music from Denmark, we’ve been covering these movements since 2011, with weekly articles in both Danish and English by musicians, academics, journalists, philosophers, and simply talented writers with a passion for new and unheard sounds. If you want to know more about the current state of strange sounds coming out of Copenhagen, read on. I’ve picked out a bunch of recent projects to keep an eye out for and a guide to which promoters and festivals to look at, all with a focus on the city’s electronic and art music scenes. The experimental music communities in Copenhagen have become more and more entangled, which is part of why it’s so interesting to follow.
None of these lists are exhaustive—in fact very far from—but they’re a good place to start.
Current artists
Irene Bianco
The Copenhagen-based Italian musician Irene Bianco is, among other projects, part of the acclaimed contemporary music collective Damkapellet in Denmark, but it was her debut solo album from last year that really caught my attention. Kronblade (Danish for petals) is an instrumental album for percussion and electronics, and while her compositions surely are characterised by experimentation and unpredictability, her music feels nonetheless intuitively captivating. Kronblade was released on Valentina Magaletti and Fanny Chiarello’s label Permanent Draft.
If you’re into Kronblade, you might also want to check out Damkapellet or some of the other members' own solo works. Passive/Aggressive also published an English langauge interview with Bianco in April this year.
Anton Friisgaard
Anton Friisgaard is mostly known for his tape loop-based ambient compositions; a project he’s been (re-)shaping continuously over different releases in recent years, first under the alias Hviledag and later under his own name. In 2024, Friisgaard put out a significantly different album—a collaborative work featuring members from the Balinese gamelan ensemble Gamelan Salukat. The album, titled Teratai Åkande (Danish for Teratai water lily—what’s up with the flower names?), was released via the Belgian label Stroom and presents the listener with a hypnotizing mixture of traditional Gamelan and contemporary electronic soundscapes.
If Teratai Åkande is your thing, you can also check out Friisgaard’s earlier solo releases, such as Album Found.
Emil Palme
Emil Palme is a Copenhagen-based guitar player, who’s been a part of the experimental music scenes in town for some years at this point, performing in sonically diverse constellations such as the avant-garde jazz band Baujilaud and the instrumental guitar duo Yngel. In April this year, Palme released his sophomore solo album, Death by angel, which is an album about … death. On both Death by angel and his first solo record Ripen, Palme plays the guitar with different stones (such as slate stone) in order to create specific tonalities, and while that might sound banal and pretentious, his music is very far from feeling like that.
In case Palme’s solo work speaks to you, make sure to give Yngel’s output a listen as well.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_m_ulKNrS4vIEA_DPeVB6LgY0Q3fZqerbE
Fine
As I said, if you want to give an account of the independent music scene in Denmark, there’s no way around Escho. Some of the most prominent Danish artists have released music on the label over the past couple of years. This group includes Astrid Sonne and Molina, who, together with ML Buch, have drawn global attention to the Danish music scene with their dreamy and often lo-fi pop music. Another slightly more overlooked artist within this aesthetic context (at least internationally) is Fine, former singer in the pop group Chinah, who released a solo record on the label in 2024.
Though it makes sense to speak about Fine’s music within the context of those aforementioned artists, it’s also fair to say that she carves out her very own unique space in the current musical landscape with her blend of bluegrass, shoegaze, folk, and pop music.
The slacker rock duo Snuggle or ML Busch’s debut album Skinned—which finally got a vinyl press this year—plays with similar nostalgic undertones, albeit in each their own subtle ways.
Halvcirkel
Halvcirkel is a string ensemble consisting of Mika Persdotter, Bettina Marie Ezaki, and Nicole Hogstrand. Inspired by minimalist composers like Terry Riley, their work can be characterized as non-hierarchical, always making space for each of the different instruments' respective roles rather than structuring the music around a single, dominant element. Their last record, Spirit, is a collaboration with the composer and musician Anders Lauge Meldgaard and sounds both joyous, intimate, and personal. Their music feels like a place you want to stay in.
If you’re a fan of simplicity and unconventional compositions, you ought to listen to Aske Zidore’s piece Lark Animations from last year (performed by Ezaki as well) or Mads Emil Dreyer’s recent work, among others.
Blue Lake
American artist Jason Dungan has been part of the experimental music scene in Copenhagen as an artist, but he also runs the label and (intimate!) venue Polychrome, which is an extension of his own private home. As Blue Lake, Dungan combines ambient soundscapes with folky guitar and his own home-build sitar-esque string instrument. The result is a soothing, uplifting, and at the same time almost meditative sound, not quite like anything else I’ve heard in recent years.
If you need more music for relaxation in these troubled times, Sofie Birch and Johan Carøe’s collaborative album for Stroom is a must-listen as well. You can also read my interview with Dungan in English from earlier this year here.
Fergus Jones
Scottish producer and DJ Fergus Jones (a.k.a. Perko) creates a genre-blending mixture of dub, grime, ambient, and leftfield techno. While his earlier records as Perko often focused on rather club-focused tracks, his first album as Fergus Jones from last year showed him experimenting with a much broader musical palette, both by himself and in the good company of artists such as Huerco S., James K, and Koreless.
On Numbers, who has released the majority of his music, you can also find two releases by Copenhagen-based producer Hekt—recommended if you’re into the earlier Perko EPs.
Promoters and festivals
A few years ago, Copenhagen began to receive international recognition for its blossoming techno scene, often characterized by trance-infused productions and a relatively fast tempo. Since then, some promoters have begun to take the local club scene in a new direction, with diverse and unpredictable lineups featuring experimental music across genres, with a mixture of club acts and performances. Some of these include Rewild and Unearth. Rewild often focuses on local contemporary acts, while Unearth also presents international artists, such as Toxe, Space Africa, Mykki Blanco, and Crystallmess.
When it comes to festivals, keep an eye out for the annual Strøm Festival (summer) or the more recent In Situ Festival (every second year), which takes place in the contemporary art gallery Simian and is co-presented by Rewild. Both festivals offer bold curation ranging from pioneering electronic acts to local sound art, and much more. If you’re in town during Strøm, remember to check out their reoccurring format Trans Metro Express, which showcases new live music by four Danish artists in the subway.
If what you’re looking for is a better glimpse into experimental and contemporary art music from Denmark, look after festivals such as Klang Festival (early summer), Festival of Endless Gratitude (fall), MINU Festival (late fall/early winter), or Organ Sound Art Festival (early winter). While Klang is the biggest festival for contemporary music in Denmark, MINU has positioned itself as a new exciting festival with a slightly similar profile, though with a bigger focus on multimedia work and performances. Organ Sound Art Festival focuses—perhaps unsurprisingly—on experimental organ music, both showcasing international and local acts, including premieres of commissioned work. The festival always takes place at KoncertKirken, a former church that is now a music venue.
Contrary to a festival like Organ Sound Art Festival, which focuses on a rather well-defined niche, Festival of Endless Gratitude always delivers a stylistically broad lineup; at the festival, you can be more or less sure to find everything from, say, international leftfield club music to avant-garde experimentation. If their program is your thing, you should also check if promoters like Final Descent and Noisy Beehive are organizing any shows while you are in Copenhagen.
While this piece focuses exclusively on Copenhagen, note that there’s a lot of great festivals elsewhere in Denmark, such as Alter and SPOR Festival in Aarhus, the second biggest city in Denmark. There’s also events on some of the smaller islands; for instance Øhavet on Ærø or Fanø Free Folk Festival on Fanø.
Endnote
The majority of Copenhagen artists picked up by international press have very often been released on, or are in some way connected to, very few labels, in particular Posh Isolation (RIP!) and Escho—labels who have had an unparalleled impact on the music coming out of the city over the past approximately 15 years or so. That said, without wanting to downplay the high quality of their output, the experimental music scenes in town amount to so much more than what these labels have put out over the years. There’s a reason why you also find Danish artists being released on prominent international labels, such as Stroom, Tonal Union, Permanent Draft, and the like.
Though one might argue that Copenhagen’s international reputation peaked some years ago, what’s happening right now across many musical genres marks an exciting era for its independent music scene.
Photo Credits: Anton Friisgaard photo by Signe Filtenborg, Blue Lake photo by Alex Kozobolis, Emil Palme photo by Roberto Bordiga, Irene Bianco photo by Malwa Grabowska, Snuggle photo by Nis Bysted
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