Liv Runesdatter is a vocalist, composer, and producer; a critically acclaimed, award-winning, and genre-crossing performer.

For nearly 25 years, she has created and performed at festivals, stage productions, installation works, exhibitions, record releases, films, and thousands of concerts, collaborating with musicians, dancers, visual artists, stage artists, filmmakers, and researchers from more than 30 countries.

She has performed her music at a wide range of festivals and venues across Europe, the Caucasus, the Middle East, Canada, and the USA, and has appeared on radio and TV channels in Germany, Norway, Azerbaijan, Palestine, the Netherlands, Belgium, Great Britain, Ireland, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Spain.

She is a generous and knowledgeable communicator who creates intimate and memorable experiences while maintaining uncompromising artistic quality.

Throughout her career, she has received several national and international awards and grants, including six work grants and a miscellaneous grant from the Norwegian State Artist Stipend (2007, 2008, 2011, 2016, 2017, 2020, 2021), from Rogaland County Municipality (2023), and the Municipality of Stavanger (2024). In autumn 2010, she received a national Azerbaijani music award for her work with Sari Gelin, a Norwegian-Azerbaijani folk music project, and in 2017, a Palestinian music award for the project And still They Sing. In 2021, Runesdatter was honored with Rolf Gammeleng’s Honorary Award.

She is the artistic director and singer of Song Circus, a vocal chamber ensemble composed of professional Norwegian vocalists specializing in contemporary music and improvisation. Song Circus is a non-traditional vocal ensemble, designed as an instrument featuring singers with diverse qualities and musical approaches, boasting an extensive sound vocabulary.

Song Circus has performed at festivals and stages across Europe. The ensemble has also participated in curated events such as Classical

and Nordic Music Days. Since 2015, Song Circus has collaborated with Lindberg Lyd / 2L, releasing the album Anatomy of Sound, which was nominated for the Spellemann Prize. They have also released an EP and a short film created in collaboration with award-winning Danish film director Maja Friis.

Liv Runesdatter has worked extensively with Norwegian folk music, conducting field research in Vestfold and collaborating with folk musicians from Azerbaijan, Gambia, Tanzania, Baluchistan, Iran, India, Palestine, Syria, Lebanon, and the Nordic countries, including Sámi performers. From 2007 to 2013, she worked closely with traditional musicians from Latin America (through nearly 600 concerts via Rikskonsertene and DKS). Since 2009, she has particularly focused on Arabic music (maqam/mugham). In 2009 and 2010, she spent significant time in Azerbaijan, where she composed and performed music for the project Sari Gelin.

Since 2012, she has collaborated with the Norwegian-Yemeni writer Mansur Rajih, composing music for many of his poems. She has created two concert performances based on his poetry, and presented author talks and concerts in Norway, Germany, the Caucasus, and the Middle East, both with her own ensemble and in reworked versions alongside musicians from Azerbaijan, Palestine, and Norway. The album Likevel Synger De features music set to Mansur Rajih’s poetry.

Her album Sing hjerte is a collection of religious folk music from Vestfold. It received enthusiastic reviews from international press outlets, and the Dutch magazine Folk World selected Sing hjerte for its list of «Best International Record Releases of 2009.»

Throughout her career, Liv Runesdatter has been involved in numerous film projects, primarily as a composer, performer, and producer. In 2023, she made her directorial debut with the film Birds . Birds has been screened at 27 festivals in 16 different countries, as well as in 130 screenings for Norwegian schoolchildren. The film has won nine international film awards and received three honorable mentions.

Liv Runesdatter also founded the Sound of a Cage Triennale (2010, 2013, 2016), inspired by the legacy of composer, poet, anarchist, and academic John Cage. The festival combines art, music, dance, and performance with workshops, lectures, and expert discussions, drawing on Cage’s legacy and that of his contemporaries.

Her collaborators include improvisational musicians such as Svante Henryson, Nils Økland, Stian Carstensen, Alfred Janson, Frode Fjellheim, Snorre Bjerck, Eivin One Pedersen, Trygve Seim, Rolf-Erik Nystrøm, Paal Nilssen-Love, Else Olsen Storesund, Torben Snekkestad, John Abercrombie, and Charles Lloyd; traditional musicians such as Britt Pernille Frøholm, Harpreet Bansal, Ahmad Al Khatib, Youssef Hbeish, Abdulrahman Surizehi, Ulla Pirttijärvi, Amadou Sarr, Mahmoud Moneeb Rachdan, Lelo Nika, Alim Qasimov, Ehtiram Huseynov, and Elshan Mansurov; composers such as Catherine Lamb, Eivind Buene, Pascale Criton, Therese Birkelund Ulvo, Christian Wolff, Trevor Wishart, Jaap Blonk, Ruben Sverre Gjertsen, Ole-Henrik Moe, David Moss, and Nils Henrik Asheim; and ensembles including Red Note Ensemble (UK), I Solisti del Vento (Belgium), Oslo Sinfonietta, Stavanger Symphony Orchestra, The Kitchen Orchestra, Stavanger Cathedral Ensemble, Tarozzi/Walker, and Cirque de Soleil (Canada). Her performance and artistic collaborators also include performance artist Anne-M E Rygh, choreographers Hanna Savolainen (Finland), Jair Cardoso (Brazil), Nadja Hjorton (Sweden), Marie Ronold Mathisen, Marit Sandsmark, and Mari Flønes, director Valentina Cechi, film director Maja Friis, scenographer Katherine Lane, poets Odveig Klyve, Jan Erik Vold, Torild Wardenær, Lavinia Murray, and Mansur Rajih (Yemen/Norway), the performing arts company Brave New Worlds, and visual artists Eli Glader, Tove Kommedal, Anne Marte Eidseth Rygh, as well as film production companies such as von Mörner and Hinterland.