Iceland Airwaves’ 2026 Edition Ditched Headliners in Major Shake-Up: ‘If You’re Not Evolving, You’ll Just Die and Wither’

It’s difficult not to be charmed, and in rather a hurry, by a city as thoroughly enamored with its musical heritage as Reykjavík. The first clue comes at 30,000 feet, with Icelandair’s in-flight playlists devoted entirely to homegrown artists. Down on terra firma, The World Of Icelandic Music, a new audio-guided exhibition downtown, charts a century-spanning journey of the country’s sounds, traversing folky beginnings and the anarcho-punk scene of the 1980s, through to the international success of Björk, Sigur Rós and contemporary jazz-pop star Laufey.

“Icelandic music can stand tall and proud on its own; it’s like a brand name in itself,” Ísleifur Þórhallsson, festival manager of Iceland Airwaves and founder and CEO of Sena Live, the nation’s leading concert promoter, tells Billboard U.K. “There’s always so much good stuff to be found, the energy and variety of what you can find here is crazy. There’s always something new to discover every single year.”

Perhaps it’s the near-subzero temperatures outside, or the occasional gust of wind sweeping through Reykjavík, but there’s a giddy energy about Þórhallsson when we chat in the lobby of the Parliament Hotel, which serves as a de facto meeting place for industry delegates. Dressed in an Iceland Airwaves-branded t-shirt and cap, he talks fast and fires off observations and anecdotes with gusto, as if there’s always another story waiting to be told. 

The tastemaking festival and conference (Nov. 4-8) is back in town for its 27th edition, bringing together oodles of local talent and international names to offer a snapshot of a musical community whose ambition and reach continues to exceed the limitations of its size. (Iceland has a population of approximately 395,050.) Situated halfway between North America and Europe, it is also in a position to capitalize on the fast-growing market for music tourism, which Fortune Business Insights valued at $106.9 billion globally in 2025. Its national airline, Icelandair, founded Iceland Airwaves in 1999 and it remains the festival’s founding sponsor, investing heavily in the event’s marketing to attract tourists outside of the summer season.

This year, almost half of the acts booked are Icelandic, with the lineup spanning established names such as Agent Fresco, Ólöf Arnalds and underground producer Knackered, alongside an emergent generation of artists making their mark at home. They range from the dumb, sublime electroclash fun of duo Amor Vincit Omnia to Una Torfa, a folk singer-songwriter whose wistful sound recalls fellow Icelanders Of Monsters and Men, alongside freak-fried ravers SCAM, returning favourites Inspector Spacetime and RAKEL’s pulsing, melancholic pop.

Alongside the official Iceland Airwaves program, music spills out of every manner of venues across the city over the week, from house parties and record stores Space Odyssey and Smekkleysa to the Hlemmur foodhall. Design studio Endurtakk hosted a live sewing event replete with three hours of acoustic sets on Friday (Nov. 6), while Lupina, an alt-pop act with shades of Sophia Stel or 070 Shake, previewed the festival with an intimate performance at the world-famous Sky Lagoon thermal baths three days prior.

Þórhallsson is buoyant about how, since Sena took over the event in 2018 and has continued to work alongside the government, Iceland Airwaves has “come a long way” in becoming a commercially viable proposition without losing sight of its founding purpose: to provide a platform for local musical discovery and movement. For 2026, that means steering away from the traditional headliner model and adding three standalone shows from Shygirl, Daði Freyr and The Streets, staged outside the main program, in what he describes as a decidedly more overt move to reach new audiences while generating additional ticket revenue. 

“We made the decision early on when we started working the festival that we’re going to be completely honest and transparent about everything we do with it,” Þórhallsson explains. “We have had to make some changes: we’ve had to drop some venues, change the program and get control of the ‘off-venues’ [unofficial fringe gigs taking place across the city]. People might complain about this and that, but it’s all about focusing on the future of the festival.”

The practical implications of that approach is most evident in the absence of the Reykjavík Art Museum, one of Iceland Airwaves’ longest-standing venues, for 2026. The 1,000-capacity room had previously played host to sets from the likes of Fontaines D.C., but bookings and program manager Sindri Ástmarsson says rising hire costs, fire safety restrictions and changes to curfew and noise limits made the venue difficult to sustain. Despite its “iconic” status, he says dropping it was a necessary decision for the festival to move forward: “If you’re not evolving, you’ll just die and wither.”

Since joining the Iceland Airwaves team eight years ago, Ástmarsson has kept programming in a state of perpetual “experiment.” In 2025, that meant courting Gen Z attendees with bookings such as SoundCloud rapper IAN and British drum ’n’ bass artist Kenya Grace. This year, he says, the thinking behind the aforementioned standalone shows is less about adding bigger marquee names but creating accessible entry points by giving younger fans a lower-cost way to catch a contemporary favorite like Shygirl, or offering orchestral shows with Daði Freyr and The Streets — both returning Iceland Airwaves performers — to those who prefer a more traditional, seated concert experience over the late-night chaos of venue-hopping. 

“It’s also really hard to sell music discovery to people who aren’t in the music business, to get them to come and experience new things,” he continues. “I used to say Iceland Airwaves isn’t the festival where you see your favorite band; it’s where you see your next favorite band. These shows might be very different to what all the showcase festivals in Europe are doing but we have to respect different audience types and keep the door open to them, too.”

Those burning questions of audience development and commercial sustainability were also on the agenda at the Iceland Airwaves conference over at NASA, a former nightclub. Speaking alongside a panel of festival programmers from across the globe, Richy Muirhead, founder of the Scottish Alternative Music Awards (SAMA) and PITCH Scotland, an international hip-hop showcase held annually in Glasgow, argued that “diversification is becoming the most important thing to the survival of showcase festivals.” Through PITCH, Muirhead has developed a model that combines an awards ceremony, a conference, live sets and partnerships, while encouraging performing artists to attend delegate meet-ups in order to better engage with the industry.

“In order for events like ours to keep growing, we have to keep thinking of ways to broaden our offering as a showcase festival,” Muirhead continued. “That’s where the other initiatives come in, to better align the interests of different audiences we might have.”

For María Rut Reynisdóttir, director at Iceland Music, the challenge extends beyond Iceland Airwaves itself, in ensuring the ecosystem behind the festival remains strong enough to empower the next generation of ticket-buyers and artists. Despite widespread national pride in Icelandic music, domestic artists account for just 17% of what young Icelanders stream, she notes. She is eager to work towards rekindling younger audiences’ appetite for live music, as a decline in festival attendance among 18-30-year-olds has persisted since the pandemic.

Following an Iceland Music report due to be published on Dec. 1, a social media campaign targeting 18-30-year-olds will seek to address this disconnect, informed by data showing that the age group primarily discovers Icelandic music through friends and family. Meanwhile, a new initiative between Music Managers Forum (MMF) U.K. and MMF Iceland aims to develop new managers in Iceland by sponsoring two participants to undertake an MMF U.K. certification program incorporating a management retreat and professional development workshops.

“Even though Iceland is a small market, musicians here have a strong home base and a system that supports them,” she says. “It’s an environment where they can thrive. The scene has its own distinct elements: community, collaboration across genres, a DIY spirit and a relative lack of industry infrastructure as we don’t have major labels here. That gives artists the freedom to create. I think it would be interesting, going forward, to talk more openly and broadly about these qualities — you could call it the ‘Icelandic way.’”