AURORA

Aurora Aksnes (born 15 June 1996), known mononymously as Aurora (stylised in all capital letters), is a Norwegian singer, songwriter and record producer. Known for blending electropop, folk, and art pop, she has been described as a pioneer of the Norwegian art pop scene and dubbed the "Fairy of Pop". She started writing songs and learning dance at age six, and gained recognition as a teenager after a classmate posted her music online without her knowledge. Initially trained on the piano, she later learned percussion and production.

Aurora signed with Petroleum, Decca, and Glassnote Records in 2014, and released her debut extended play (EP), Running with the Wolves, in 2015. Its lead single, "Runaway", gained massive popularity years later after going viral on TikTok. Her debut studio album, All My Demons Greeting Me as a Friend, was released to positive reviews in 2016, topping the Norwegian VG-lista and earning international success. Aurora followed her debut with a two-part concept album: Infections of a Different Kind (Step 1) (2018) and A Different Kind of Human (Step 2) (2019).

Her fourth studio album, The Gods We Can Touch (2022), marked her first top-10 entry in the UK. In 2024, she released her fifth album, What Happened to the Heart?, which charted highly across Europe. In 2025, Aurora shifted towards a more electronic-focused sound when she formed the musical project Tomora with Tom Rowlands of The Chemical Brothers, releasing the album Come Closer the following year. Beyond her solo work, Aurora has collaborated with a range of artists, including Jacob Collier, Wu Qing-feng, Sondre Lerche, Tom Odell, Askjell, Bring Me the Horizon, and Hans Zimmer.

Her contributions extend to soundtracks for numerous films, television series, and video game franchises, such as Frozen 2, Wolfwalkers, the live-action One Piece series, Kaiju No. 8, FIFA, Sky: Children of the Light, Assassin's Creed, and Genshin Impact. With 10 billion streams, Aurora is the most-streamed female Norwegian artist of all time, and she has toured in more than 50 countries across Europe, the Americas, Asia and Oceania. Her accolades include four Spellemann Awards, an EBBA Award, and the P3 Prize at the P3 Gull. At age 21, she became the youngest person to earn a stone on the Bergen Walk of Fame, later receiving a spot on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list.

Early life

Aurora Aksnes was born on 15 June 1996 at Stavanger University Hospital in Stavanger, Norway, the youngest of three daughters to midwife May Britt Froastad and garage door salesman Jan Øystein Aksnes. Her eldest sister, Miranda, is a makeup artist and former teacher, while her other sister, Viktoria, is a fashion designer, stylist, and blogger. Aurora spent her early years in Høle, a small town where her parents had lived for 15 years, a remote village in the woodlands of the Os mountains in Hordaland, near Bergen and Lysefjord. She described her childhood home in Drange as a quiet, car-free area with abundant trees and poor internet connectivity.

Growing up surrounded by nature, Aurora identified as a "forest person", enjoying activities like climbing trees, and valuing the isolation and safety of her environment. but she preferred solitary moments in forests, As a child, she was uncomfortable with physical affection and had an unusual hobby of collecting dead insects, At age 11, she attended a funeral on Christmas Eve, an event that contributed to her developing dysphemia, prompting her to learn sign language. The loss of a friend from her sign language class in a car accident and two close friends—one to suicide and another in the 2011 Utøya massacre—deeply affected her, released in 2015. influenced by artists like Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Enya, and the Chemical Brothers. She also explored other ambitions, including becoming a doctor, physicist, or dancer, and trained in dance from ages 6 to 16, performing in a contemporary dance group at the Norwegian Youth Festival of Art to songs like Paramore's "Decode" and Michael Jackson's "Ghosts". Her dislike of her own voice initially deterred her from considering a singing career.

Aurora's earliest known composition was "The Lonely Man", followed by "I Had a Dream", which addressed global challenges. Although she considered it a "really long and boring song about world peace", she performed it once at her high school's leaving ceremony. Before pursuing music, Aurora worked briefly washing the exterior of a pizza restaurant. The uploads quickly gained thousands of views in Norway, building her an early fan base on Facebook. In early 2013, a representative from Made Management, a Norwegian management company, discovered her work and invited her to their office. Though initially hesitant, Aurora was persuaded by her mother to consider sharing her music, recognising its potential to resonate with others. Aurora signed recording contracts with Petroleum, Decca, and Glassnote Records in 2014. That same year, she released the singles "Awakening" and "Under Stars", with the former earning her the title of Untouched of the Week on NRK Urørt. Her distinctive vocal style and musicality drew critical acclaim across Europe and the United States, establishing her as a promising new artist.

In May 2015, Aurora released her debut EP, Running with the Wolves, which received positive reviews from online music publications and Norwegian media. The EP's lead single, "Runaway", enjoyed a major resurgence in 2021 after going viral on TikTok, reaching number 22 on the Billboard Global 200 and number 25 on the UK Singles Chart. Later in 2015, her cover of Oasis' "Half the World Away" for the John Lewis Christmas advert peaked at number 11 on the UK Singles Chart. In December, she performed at the Nobel Peace Prize Concert, describing the experience as "an incredibly beautiful thing to be a part of." Host Jay Leno praised her performance.

In early 2016, Aurora won the Spellemann Award for Newcomer of the Year, along with a 250,000-kroner Gramo scholarship, and the EBBA Award for international breakthrough with Running with the Wolves. Her debut studio album, All My Demons Greeting Me as a Friend, was released in March and topped Norway's VG-lista for two consecutive weeks, marking her as the first Norwegian debutant to achieve a number-one debut since Emilie Nicolas in 2014. The record wove themes of fantasy, heartache, life, and death, drawing comparisons to Björk, Florence Welch, and Enya. As of September 2018, the album had sold 500,000 copies worldwide and was supported by a year-long international concert tour that began in North America and ended in Brazil.

That same year, Aurora contributed a cover of David Bowie's "Life on Mars" to the HBO series Girls. She made her American television debut on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, performing "Conqueror"—a song previously featured in the FIFA 16 soundtrack and later included in the FIFA 23 World Cup update. She also appeared on The Howard Stern Show and The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, performing "Life on Mars" and "I Went Too Far". Additionally, she partnered with YouTube for a creative content initiative and starred in the short documentary Nothing is Eternal, directed by Isaac Ravishankara and produced by The Fader.

In November 2017, Aurora performed a Christmas concert at Nidaros Cathedral in Trondheim as part of the Olavsfestdagene.

2017–2020: Two-part album and "Into the Unknown"

Following the release of All My Demons Greeting Me as a Friend, Aurora announced in November 2016 that she had begun writing and producing her second studio album, describing her debut as the "first album of many." In 2017, she contributed a cover of "Scarborough Fair" for the Brazilian telenovela Deus Salve o Rei, also appearing in its opening sequence.

In April 2018, Aurora released "Queendom" as the lead single from her upcoming two-part album, followed by "Forgotten Love" in August. The album, recorded in France earlier that year with producers Askjell, Roy Kerr, and Tim Bran, saw Aurora deeply involved in the production process. The new material explored themes of politics, sexuality, and empowerment, inspired by interactions with fans during her debut tour, while maintaining some lyrical continuity with her first album. The music video for "Queendom", released in May 2018, emphasised inclusivity, particularly for her LGBTQ+ fanbase, featuring a scene where Aurora kissed a female dancer to symbolise acceptance of all forms of love. She previewed several new songs at festivals such as Lollapalooza and Coachella. The first part, Infections of a Different Kind (Step 1), an eight-track release, was released in September 2018, with Aurora describing its closing track as "the most important song I've ever written." The second part, A Different Kind of Human (Step 2), followed in June 2019. Aurora supported both releases with a headlining tour starting in Manchester in late 2018 and performances at festivals including Glastonbury, Groovin' the Moo, and Outside Lands.

In April 2019, Aurora co-wrote and provided vocals for three tracks—"Eve of Destruction", "Bango", and "The Universe Sent Me"—on No Geography, the ninth studio album by The Chemical Brothers. Later that year, she contributed backing vocals to "Into the Unknown" from Disney's Frozen 2 and performed it live at the 92nd Academy Awards in February 2020 with Idina Menzel and a chorus of international singers representing the song's translations. Her solo version of the song was released as a single in March 2020. Previously, in 2018, she performed a cover of "Baby Mine" as the final act at Disney's panel during CCXP for the soundtrack of Dumbo (2019).

2020–2023: The Gods We Can Touch

In November 2020, Aurora recorded the title track for the Norwegian Christmas miniseries Stjernestøv for NRK, under the musical direction of Gaute Tønder; she then contributed vocals to "Vinterens Gåte" and "Det Ev Ei Rosa Sprunge" for Herborg Kråkevik's album Juleroser. Backed by the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra, the release preceded another film contribution. Later that December, Aurora re-recorded her 2015 single "Running with the Wolves" for the animated film Wolfwalkers.

The lead single from her fourth studio album The Gods We Can Touch, "Exist for Love", was released in May 2020; presented as her first love song, it was accompanied by a self-directed music video. Created during the COVID-19 lockdown with string arrangements by Isobel Waller-Bridge, the track marked the beginning of what Aurora described as "a new era" in her career. Over the following year, she released the singles "Cure for Me" in July 2021 and "Giving In to the Love" in October. That same month, introduced by Queen Sonja, Aurora and her guitarist Fredrik Svabø performed live at the Royal Palace in Oslo during a dinner honouring Norwegian participants of the 2020 Summer Olympics and Paralympics. Later that November, she released "Midas Touch" for the soundtrack of Amazon Studios' Hanna and featured on American singer Sub Urban's track "Paramour".

The Gods We Can Touch was released in January 2022 and received critical acclaim. It achieved significant commercial success in the Greater China region, reaching 350 million streams; it also reached number one in Norway for the first time since her debut album and secured her first top-10 entry in the UK, later selling over 20,000 copies in the country.

To promote The Gods We Can Touch, Aurora embarked on an international concert tour, extending her presence across Europe, Latin America and Southeast Asia, with debut concerts in Lithuania, Romania, Taiwan, Thailand, Colombia, Indonesia, and Peru. She also performed a closing headline set at the Øya Festival in Norway, which received rave reviews and led Variety and NRK P3 to name her "one of Norway's biggest artists."

During this period, she continued to collaborate, featuring on Sondre Lerche's "Alone in the Night" in April and Wu Qing-feng's "Storm" in June. In August, she contributed vocals to Hans Zimmer's Frozen Planet II soundtrack, later performing "Take Me Back Home" at the Royal Albert Hall during the BBC's Earth Proms, before releasing "Hunting Shadows" in September for the 15th anniversary of the Assassin's Creed franchise. In October, she provided the opening and closing themes for the video game Sky: Children of the Light; an in-game virtual concert subsequently premiered after The Game Awards in December. The event returned in August 2023, achieving a Guinness World Record for "Most Users in a Concert-themed Virtual World" with 10,061 simultaneous players, and again in June 2025 as Aurora: Homecoming, celebrating her return to Norway post-tour.

2023–2025: What Happened to the Heart? In January 2023, Aurora began teasing her fifth studio album, sharing on an Instagram story that she was "working on so many babies." That same month, she collaborated with Tom Odell on the piano ballad "Butterflies". Between July and August, she contributed a cover of Nick Drake's "Pink Moon" to the tribute album The Endless Coloured Ways: The Songs of Nick Drake and released "My Sails Are Set" for the soundtrack of the live-action series One Piece.

In October 2023, Aurora teased new music by posting an audio clip and pre-save link on her official Twitter account, captioned "08.11." The following month, she released "Your Blood", her first solo single in nearly two years. This was followed in early 2024 by the singles "The Conflict of the Mind" and "Some Type of Skin". During this period, she also completed a headlining tour in Norway. In March 2024, she announced her fifth studio album, What Happened to the Heart?, which was released in June. The album fuses indie pop and disco while drawing inspiration from pop, techno, and folk music. It achieved top-10 positions in Norway, Scotland, the UK, Germany, and the Netherlands, was nominated for Release of the Year at the 2025 Spellemann Awards,

To promote the album, Aurora embarked on her fifth concert tour, titled What Happened to the Earth?. It was her first time headlining arena concerts and included debut performances in Greece, India, Mainland China, Hong Kong, Malaysia, and the Philippines, attracting over 300,000 attendees overall. The tour's video recording took place at the Palacio de los Deportes arena in Mexico City on the Day of the Dead, where Aurora played her biggest headline show to a sold-out crowd of 18,000 people; the resulting film was screened in theatres worldwide. Prior to her concert at Wembley Arena, she hosted a free retrospective exhibition, Some Type of Skin – An Exhibition, displaying her stage outfits and visual art while tracing the evolution of her aesthetic and career. and Nordoff and Robbins honoured her with the Silver Clef Award for Contemporary Music. Later that year, she released "You Can't Run from Yourself" as the opening theme for the second season of the anime Kaiju No. 8.

In addition to her solo work, Aurora featured on Bring Me the Horizon's song "Limousine" from their album Post Human: Nex Gen (2024). She also collaborated with Jacob Collier on a mashup of her song "The Seed" and his "A Rock Somewhere", performed in the Arctic to raise awareness for ocean and climate protection. She further contributed to the Genshin Impact soundtrack, performing the main theme of the Nod-Krai region alongside the London Voices and the London Symphony Orchestra. She also collaborated with Leif Vollebekk on the song "Southern Star", in which she starred in the short film of the same name, directed by Kaveh Nabatian, who had previously worked with Aurora on the videos for her previous album.

2025–present: Tomora and Come Closer

In December 2025, Aurora and Tom Rowlands from The Chemical Brothers, who previously served as a producer to What Happened to the Heart?, officially announced the formation of the electronic music duo Tomora, whose name is a portmanteau of their first names. Their style involves repetitive ethereal or eerie sounds accompanied by electronic beats.

The group performed at Coachella in April 2026 a few days before releasing their debut album Come Closer.

On the 2nd of September 2026, Aurora published her new single song "All My Demons Greeting Me As A Friend", an homage to her debut studio album, on Youtube, Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, Tidal and Deezer, in preparation for her new album The Moth Tapes which would be released fully later that month.

Artistry Influences

At home, she did not have access to radio or music channels on television; she admitted that she had listened to very few artists at the beginning of her singing career. Björk, Bob Dylan, Kate Bush, Susanne Sundfør, The Beatles, as her major influences. She said that the first album she bought was Dylan's Blonde on Blonde. She first listened to one of their songs when she was around 11 years old and described it as "so hard and so intense and dark, and it felt like an explosion." Her love for heavy metal inspired her compilation EP For the Metal People, which included some of her songs influenced by the genre. Aurora also expressed her admiration for rock musician Iggy Pop, adding that when she met him during a festival in Belgium, she was "so happy I almost peed my pants."

She has covered some of her influences' songs, some of them are "Mr. Tambourine Man", "Famous Blue Raincoat", "Life on Mars", "Across the Universe", and "Make You Feel My Love". About recent influences, Aurora stated that she dislikes listening to music, which she described as "noise" or "interference" for her, adding that she has "music in my mind all the time".

Aurora's musical style encompasses a diverse range of genres, including art pop, Nordic folk, synth-pop, electro-folk, dark pop, avant-garde pop, alt-pop, folk-pop, and new-age. Critics have described her music in various terms: Haley Weiss of Interview characterizes her as a "poetic author of art-pop" and an "unaffectedly curious artist," and Lisa Higgins of Clash describes her as an avant-garde pop artist, Her use of vocal motifs, such as "ah", "oh", and "la", is a recurring characteristic in her music. While she primarily composes in English, she has also performed songs in Norwegian, including "Stjernestøv", "Vinterens Gåte", and "Det Hev Ei Rosa Sprunge". She is proficient in playing the piano and has knowledge of other instruments, including the ukulele, guitar, and harp. Aurora occasionally contributes to the percussion and production aspects of her music. in contrast to her vocal maturity and emotional depth of her music. She later adopted a partially shaved hairstyle described as "Norwegian Viking", During the promotional period between her releases Infections of a Different Kind (Step 1) and A Different Kind of Human (Step 2), Aurora frequently performed with facial markings that symbolised "tears and smile wrinkles." Her onstage persona is often noted for its candid humor, shaped by her openness about intrusive thoughts, which she frequently shares with audiences during live performances.

Her wardrobe primarily consists of reused garments, many of which are designed by Aurora herself in collaboration with her sister Viktoria. Aurora has emphasized the importance of conscious food choices as part of a broader environmentally aware lifestyle.

Aurora identifies as a feminist and advocates for a range of human rights causes, including racial equality and LGBTQ rights. She identifies as an introvert and neurodivergent, and in a 2018 interview with The Independent described herself as bisexual, while expressing a preference for embracing love and exploration without rigid labels. Aurora also showed support for various environmental awareness movements, topics that she explored in songs like "Apple Tree", "The Seed", and "Soulless Creatures" from her second and third albums.

Aurora has been active in philanthropic and advocacy work. In October 2020, she performed her song "Warrior" for volunteers of the Clean Sounds Movement and called on fellow artists Billie Eilish and Sigrid to join the cause. She participated in a number of online music festivals, including Vi er Live (a demonstration against racism and in response to the murder of George Floyd), SOS Rainforest (in support of indigenous communities and rainforests in Africa, Asia, and South America), and the Exist For Love Sessions (to promote emerging artists). In November 2021, she headlined a non-profit charity event during COP26 to raise funds for Brian Eno's EarthPercent organization.

Achievements

Aurora has risen to prominence as one of Norway's biggest contemporary artists. She has been referred to as the "Fairy of Pop" and stands as the most-streamed female Norwegian artist of all time, with more than 10 billion streams. This achievement places her third on the overall list of most-streamed Norwegian artists, behind only Alan Walker and Kygo.

Norwegian and international critics have praised her songwriting and stage presence. Espen Borge of NRK P3 has called her "one of the world's most successful creators," highlighting her songwriting skills and vocal expressiveness. Jem Aswad of Variety has described her as one of Norway's biggest acts and a veteran of the country's music scene, while Andrew Trendell of NME has identified her as a pioneer of Norwegian art-pop. Catharina Cheung of Time Out, Aurora Henni Krogh of 730.no, and the organisers of Øya Festival have recognised her as the country's biggest pop star in recent years. Tina Løvås of Musikknyheter.no has named her "one of Norway's biggest artists of all time," noting that her discography has left a significant mark on Norwegian music history.

In her hometown of Os, then-mayor Terje Søviknes credited Aurora with leading the "Os Wave"—the local equivalent of the Bergen Wave—by inspiring a new generation of artists. He stated: "If you have had the Bergen Wave, we have the Os Wave with Aurora at the forefront. [...] Aurora's success makes others dare to pursue her dream. Aurora is leading the Os Wave forward and paving the way for the next generation."

She has received praise from fellow artists including Ane Brun, Billie Eilish, Doja Cat, Katy Perry, Shawn Mendes, SZA, and Troye Sivan. Billie Eilish has credited "Runaway" as the inspiration for her decision to pursue a music career.

Aurora has earned numerous accolades, including the P3 Prize at the P3 Gull for her impact on Norwegian music, and an EBBA Award for international success with her debut EP Running with the Wolves. At the age of 21, she became the youngest person to receive a stone on the Bergen Walk of Fame. She was named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 list in 2025 and had sold over one million albums worldwide by July 2021. In 2026, a newly discovered species of orchid in Australia, Thelymitra aurorae, was named after her.

Discography

Solo All My Demons Greeting Me as a Friend (2016) Infections of a Different Kind (Step 1) (2018) A Different Kind of Human (Step 2) (2019) The Gods We Can Touch (2022) What Happened to the Heart? (2024)

As Tomora (Aurora and Tom Rowlands) Come Closer (2026)

Videography Filmography Year Title Role Note 2015 Into the Light Herself Short film 2016 Nothing is Eternal HerselfDocumentary 2022 A Touch of the Divine "Runaway" documentary 2026 What Happened to the Earth? Live from Mexico City

Television Year Title Role Note 2017 Creeped Out Narrator Television series Concert with Aurora from Nidaros Cathedral Herself Christmas concert

Ludography Video games Year Title Note 2019 Sky: Children of the Light Provides vocals for the game's intro and outro songs 2022 Assassin's Creed Video game soundtrack 2024 Senua's Saga: Hellblade II 2025 Genshin Impact 2026 World of Warcraft

Written works The Gods We Can Touch (2023) What Happened to the Heart? (2024) All My Demons Greeting Me as a Friend (2026)