SLEEP SPIRAL Víkingur Ólafsson | Deutsche Grammophon

GRAMMY-winning Icelandic pianist Víkingur Ólafsson presents his Single Sleep Spiral, which is released to celebrate World Sleep Day. 

While Ólafsson has occasionally created arrangements, transcriptions, and highly personal interpretations of existing works, an original composition such as this marks a rare and notable new chapter in his artistic output. The piece was composed especially for the occasion and invites listeners into a deeply calming sonic landscape. With its delicate structure and quietly unfolding momentum, the piece carries an extraordinary sense of deceleration, offering a moment of stillness in an increasingly fast-paced world. Through Sleep Spiral, Ólafsson elegantly explores the emotional space of rest and reflection, translating the spirit of World Sleep Day into a refined and intimate musical experience.  

“Sleep Spiral is a piece that gently picks up and re-imagines motives from composers such as Bach, Schubert and Debussy and puts them in an other-world dreamy landscape. I start the piece in Bb Major introducing the first motives and then it spirals down chromatically to A Major. This way the piece can be listened to endlessly in a loop,” says Ólafsson.  

World Sleep Day is a global call to action to celebrate healthy sleep. Far too often, sleep medicine professionals and researchers encounter the false belief that sleep is not an important factor in maintaining personal health and wellbeing. Since 2008, the World Sleep Society has used World Sleep Day to encourage its delegates and sleep health advocates to take action in their local communities, clinics, and countries to raise awareness for sleep health.