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D<\/span>espite its modest population of about 400,000 \u2013 that\u2019s roughly the size of Bristol \u2013 Iceland punches significantly above its weight, artistically. Musicians from V\u00edkingur \u00d3lafsson to Bj\u00f6rk, and composers from what has been called the First Icelandic School regularly top the bill in concert halls worldwide. But is there such a thing as an Icelandic sound?<\/p>\n An afternoon programme of chamber and choral music suggested not. Casting its net wide, the 20th-century European mainstream was much in evidence. Hafli\u00f0i Hallgr\u00edmsson\u2019s Seven Epigrams for violin and cello, stylishly performed by Phoebe Rousochatzaki and Kosta Popovic, might have been by Schnittke. A homage to leading Soviet artists, it included a suitably jittery portrait of Shostakovich.<\/p>\n The choral works, impeccably performed by the BBC Singers, were more idiomatically Icelandic, rooted as they were in a plainspoken Lutheranism. Anna Thorvaldsdottir\u2019s sparse yet sonorous Hear Us in Heaven was the standout; Hj\u00e1lmar H Ragnarsson\u2019s tangy Ave Maria suggested Poulenc. More experimental works, such as Thorvaldsdottir\u2019s quirky Sequences <\/em>for bass flute, bass clarinet, baritone sax and contrabassoon, were intriguing, if less concrete than her striking orchestral scores.<\/p>\n If anyone defines the current Icelandic aesthetic, it\u2019s Thorvaldsdottir, so it was a pity none of her music appeared in the BBC Symphony Orchestra\u2019s evening concert. As it was, two of the works were repurposed from earlier projects with varying success. \u00d3lafur Arnalds<\/a>\u2019 Another Kind of Peace, here receiving its world premiere, was a collaboration with composer Viktor Orri \u00c1rnason. A symphonic suite based on Arnalds\u2019 album of the same name, it never quite hid its ambient roots, coming across as a series of introductions that generally went nowhere, and with souped-up orchestrations that felt insufficiently differentiated.<\/p>\n