A Franco-Swedish composer born in 1956 in Stockholm.
Madeleine Isaksson studied at the Royal Music Academy in Stockholm from 1979 to 1987. She won a diploma for piano teaching then studied composition with Gunnar Bucht and Sven-David Sandström. She also studied in Amsterdam with Louis Andriessen and in Royaumont with Brian Ferneyhough. The music of Morton Feldman, Giacinto Scelsi, Iannis Xenakis and Emmanuel Nunes nurtured her artistic journey as did the visual arts and literature. Madeleine Isaksson's music can be characterized by a dramatic inner concentration and the expression of intimacy, a fluctuating metric sensitive to the laws of gravity. Among her compositions, both instrumental and vocal, are: Tillstånd-Avstånd for instrumental ensemble (premiered by KammarensembleN, 1992), Axis for violin and percussion (premiered by Hae-Sun Kang and Daniel Ciampolini at Radio France, 2002), Les sept vallées (2006) for solo recorder (Järnåker composition prize in 2012), Isär for instrumental ensemble (premiered by Norrbotten Neo Ensemble during the New Sweden Festival, 2012), Vide supra, violin duet (premiered by Duo Gelland, 2014), Traces for string trio (premiered at Konserthuset, Stockholm, 2017), Springkällor for improvising pianist and ensemble (premiered by Arne Frosen and KammarensembleN, 2018).
