As previously reported on mbl.is, the first concert in the new Harpa Concert Hall and Conference Centre will be held on 4th May next year. Vladimir Ashkenazy will be the first performer, leading the Icelandic Symphony Orchestra as he so often does.

The main hall at Harpa will accommodate around eighteen hundred guests in its seats. Such is the demand that it has now been completely booked from the opening date until Christmas 2011, according to Pétur J. Eiríksson, chairman of Portus Group, who has been overseeing the construction of the venue.

For the next 35 years, the state and the City of Reykjavík will pay just under one billion krónur a year to pay for the construction of Harpa. Pétur says that the final cost of construction for the building will stand at 17.7 billion krónur. The government will not take over operations initially, rather at some time in the future. “We are predicting positive cash flow soon, in the third year. Until that time, we will need to finance the running costs.”

The project was controversially funded by the government after the bank collapse, who promised that they would secure all the funding necessary to complete the project. After construction came to a stop in 2008, it since resumed in 2009 and is expected to be completed early next year.

Source: mbl.is
Image: harpa.is

Labels: Harpa