Mikael Karlsson

Mikael was born in Sweden in 1975, and moved to New York in 2000 after abandoning a stalled career in liquor retail.
 
Mikael holds a masters degree in composition from the Aaron Copland School of Music and graduated Summa Cum Laude with departmental honors in June of 2005.He has received numerous awards for his compositions and his music has been performed at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Cathedral of St. John the Divine, Galapagos Art Space, The Tank, Issue Project Room, Peter Jay Sharp Theater,The DUO Theater, The Stone, LeFrak Concert Hall and many other lovely venues in New York. He has been featured by WNYC's Soundcheck with John Schaefer and by the New York Times. The sheet music to his widely performed piece Nasty Fucker (flute and electronics - recorded by Claire Chase for Mikael's debut album Privacy) was published in Butt Magazine. He has collaborated with Lykke Li, Kleerup, Bruce LaBruce, Claire Chase, Joshua Rubin, Alexander Ekman, Mariam Wallentin, American Contemporary Music Ensemble (ACME), Nederlands Dans Theater 2 (NDT2), International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), Alan Pierson, Mivos Quartet, David Taylor, Rebecca Ringle, Othon Mataragas, Wolfram Koessel, Black Sun Productions, Lydia Lunch, Benoit-Swan Pouffer, Maria Beatty, Lovisa Inserra, Victoria Bergsman (Taken By Trees), Cory Smythe, Wolfram Koessel, Francois Rousseau, ASS (Andreas Söderström), The Swedish Royal Ballet, Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, The Norwegian National Ballet, BBC, Christopher Young, Lovisa Inserra, Governess Films, W Magazine, Neon Lighthouse, Swoon NYC, Harumi Terayama, Swedish TV4, Harry Winston, Sewdish Film Industry, Rob Stephenson, Christopher McDonald and many more.
In 2007, he was an honoree of the 2007 OUT100 top 100 influential people, listed as that year's composer. In 2011, the listeners of Q2 radio (NY public radio) voted Mikael as one of their favorite 100 composers under 40.
 
His music is on the soundtrack of films by acclaimed experimental filmmakers Barbara Hammer (History Lessons, 2001 - an Official Sundance Selection that year), Maria Beatty (Bandaged), Christopher Young (Orpheus and Eurydice 2001 - released by Please Records as a separate soundtrack cd), Bruce LaBruce's two latest film Otto; or, Up With Dead People, L.A. Zombie and many others. His music is moving on to video games with his Tobias Wagner / Roman Vinuesa collaboration, Battlefield - Bad Company.
 
Mikael is the personal representative of celebrated composer Tobias Picker and was recently given a fourth Extraordinary Talent Visa for the US. He teaches at the Aaron Copland School of Music at Queens College in NYC.
 
In 2003, he co-founded film scoring collective Please MusicWorks LLC, which has grown to include more than 100 of New York’s best performers. www.pleasemusicworks.com.
 
In 2006, he released the cd “dog” with Rob Stephenson, and in Dec 2008, the album Privacy. EPs Instead and Seven Eight were released in 2008 and 2010.