Alex Somers

Alex Somers, a musician and visual artist with roots in Baltimore, moved through the 2000s after finishing his studies by forming one half of the experimental outfit Parachute while also creating artwork for acts such as Sigur Rós. His partnership with the band’s frontman Jónsi, born Jon Thor Birgisson, extended across both visual projects and musical ventures, culminating in the 2009 release Riceboy Sleeps under the Jónsi & Alex moniker. Along the way he accumulated production, engineering, and mixing experience, eventually establishing a personal studio that hosted work with Sigur Rós, Pascal Pinon, and Sound of Ceres during the following decade. His atmospheric synth textures reached cinema screens through the 2016 score for Captain Fantastic and the 2019 music for Honey Boy, after which he issued the solo albums Siblings and Siblings 2 in 2021.

Born in Baltimore, Somers pursued composition at Berklee College of Music in Boston and visual art at the Iceland Academy of the Arts in Reykjavik, thereafter dividing his professional life between the two countries. In 2003 he formed the experimental duo Parachute with Scott Alario in Boston, issuing a self-titled debut EP that December from home recordings. The same year marked the start of his ongoing art and music collaboration with Jónsi. Returning to Parachute, the pair tracked their sole full-length, Susy, in Tuscany, Italy, and released it in December 2004.

Under the name Riceboy Sleeps, Somers and Birgisson unveiled an art book of the same title in Iceland in 2006, followed by international distribution in 2007. That year also brought their first gallery shows beyond Iceland, in Arkansas and Melbourne, plus two musical pieces—“All the Big Trees” and “Daníell in the Sea”—each accompanied by video. Somers captured Parachute’s EP Tree Roots in Iceland and delivered the material in 2008. After several years of sporadic acoustic sessions recorded across Iceland, he and Birgisson refined the material with string-quartet contributions from longtime Sigur Rós associates Amiina and vocal work by the Kópavogsdætur Choir. Mixing took place in February 2009 at a remote, solar-powered, raw-food commune in Hawaii. One track, “Happiness,” surfaced unfinished on the Red Hot Organization’s Dark Was the Night compilation. When the completed album appeared in July 2009, the duo had adopted the name Jónsi & Alex.

Somers inaugurated his own downtown Reykjavik facility in 2010, producing Sin Fang’s Flowers and Julianna Barwick’s Nepenthe in 2013 while contributing to Sigur Rós albums Valtari in 2012 and Kveikur in 2013. Beginning in 2014 he and Birgisson joined the scoring team for the two-season television drama Manhattan. Subsequent film assignments encompassed Captain Fantastic in 2016 and Honey Boy in 2019, alongside additional television projects. A second Jónsi & Alex album, Lost & Found, surfaced in 2019 on the tenth anniversary of its predecessor.

Somers’ music appeared in the 2020 Baltimore film Charm City Kings, also known as Twelve, and in the Taylor Swift documentary Miss Americana. On March 19, 2021 he released the solo albums Siblings and Siblings 2, which delved into ambient and experimental electronic textures alongside post-rock and modern composition. That year also included the comedy score for Together Together and the collaborative release Light Past Blue with Aska Matsumiya, originally created for an exhibit by French artist Claire Tabouret and featuring cellist Gyða Valtýsdóttir of Múm plus harpist Mary Lattimore. In 2022 his scores accompanied the scripted features Fresh and Causeway as well as the documentaries Cai Stay on Board: The Leo Baker Story and Branson.