Sigurður Thordarsson was born April 8, 1895, in Dyrafjordur in the northwestern part of Iceland. The son of a minister of the Lutheran Church of Iceland, he grew up in a musical atmosphere but did not, however devote himself to serious study of music until he went to the capital city of Reykjavík. Graduating from a mercantile college there, he continuded his musical studies in Germany, principally in Leipzig where he lived for three years, attending the Royal Conservatory. He founded the Reykjavik Male Choir. Thordarsson took the Male Choir on their first extended concert tour in 1935, appearing in Norway, Sweden and Denmark. Two years later they went to Central Europe, and to America in the 1946-47. As a composer, his works run the gamut from a mass to an operetta to orchestral and piano pieces
