Biography

Foto: Aija Svensson

Alvi Joensen is a versatile guitarist with a passion for contemporary art music. For his diploma exam concert he commissioned a guitar concerto from the renowned Swedish composer Staffan Storm. The concerto is called “Distant Fires” and was premiered by the Swedish string orchestra Musica Vitae and the internationally acclaimed percussionist Johan Bridger. In 2021 Alvi Joensen released his debut album “Lost Gems”, consisting of the rarely played pearls on the verge of oblivion. Alvi Joensen is an avid chamber musician, working in several ensembles. His most notable ensemble is duo HAV, which consists of him and the Finnish flutist Marianne Sihvonen, and focuses on the combination of environmental issues and contemporary art music. They have already commissioned almost a dozen pieces from various composers in Northern Europe that will be performed in 2022 in places such as the Odeum concert series in Lund, Nordens Hus in Faroe Islands and the very popular new music concert series Moderne Mandag in Copenhagen. Alvi Joensen is also part of a more unique ensemble, Trio Vilse (The Lost Trio), consisting of recorder, clarinet and guitar. The ensemble started within the project “Vilse i skogen” (Lost in the woods), which was an experimental performance with three dancers, three musicians and three commissioned pieces staged in the woods. Since then Trio Vilse has performed many concerts with contemporary music and has commissioned several new pieces that will be premiered in the fall 2022 in Allhelgonakyrkan in Lund. Alvi Joensen has won competitions, such as Stella Polaris in Faroe Islands and studied with the famous Swedish guitarist Göran Söllscher in Malmö. He has also worked as a basso continuo player in different baroque projects with Peter Spissky and Andrew Lawrence King and teaches guitar at the Malmö Academy of Music. In his spare time he loves to cook and challenge himself with increasingly more difficult recipes.