The Nobel Week in Stockholm begins

The 2013 Nobel Laureates are now arriving in Stockholm, Sweden, where they will be guests of honour during a week filled with activities, culminating in the Nobel Prize Award Ceremony and the Nobel Banquet on December 10. The Nobel Foundation’s new Chairman of the Board, Professor Carl-Henrik Heldin, will be the host of the Nobel Day events for the first time.

Eleven Laureates will participate in the activities in Stockholm together with family, friends and colleagues. Alice Munro, Laureate in Literature, will not attend due to health reasons, but will be represented during the Nobel Week by her daughter Jenny Munro.

The Nobel Week will begin on December 6 with a visit to the Nobel Museum in Stockholm’s Old Town, where the Laureates will follow the tradition of autographing chairs in the Museum’s Bistro. During the following days, the Laureates will give press conferences and hold their Nobel Lectures. The Nobel Lecture in Literature will be replaced by a pre-recorded video conversation with Alice Munro, which will be shown in the Grand Hall of the Swedish Academy on December 7.

The world-famous Italian conductor Riccardo Muti will lead this year’s edition of the Nobel Prize Concert. The programme on December 8 in the Stockholm Concert Hall will have an Italian theme. 

On December 9, the Nobel Week Dialogue is being organised for the second time. This year the meeting will take place in Gothenburg, Sweden, under the title Exploring the Future of Energy. The purpose of this full-day seminar, organised by Nobel Media, is to promote a broader dialogue between researchers and society. Several previous Nobel Laureates will participate.

The Nobel Day, December 10, will begin with the Nobel Prize Award Ceremony at the Stockholm Concert Hall, where the Laureates will be presented in speeches by members of the respective Nobel Committees. The Chairman of the Board of the Nobel Foundation, Professor Carl-Henrik Heldin, who assumed his position on May 1 this year, will hold an opening address and will serve as host of the day’s events for the first time. The Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, under the baton of conductor Andreas Hanson, will provide musical interludes during the award ceremony. This year’s soloist is soprano Malin Byström.

After the traditional award ceremony, it will be time for the Nobel Banquet at the Stockholm City Hall. The evening’s entertainment will consist of a divertissement performed by

Divine – The Opera Trio. The director is Ingela Lundh, and Gunilla Petterson will be in charge of costume, make-up and hair design.

In charge of composing this year’s Banquet menu are Andreas Hedlund (2002 Swedish Chef of the Year) along with Fredrik Björlin, former captain of the Swedish Culinary Team and now head chef at Artipelag in Stockholm, as well as confectioners Conrad Tyrsén (2009 Swedish Confectioner of the Year) and Ted Johansson of Dessert & Choklad Stockholm. Chef de Cuisine is Gunnar Eriksson. Gastronomic advisors to the Nobel Foundation are Fredrik Eriksson, Långbro Värdshus, Artistic Leader of Restaurangakademien; and Gert Klötzke, Professor of Gastronomy at Umeå University. This year, for the first time, the Nobel Banquet is Nordic Ecolabelled. This is because during the autumn, Stadshusrestauranger (City Hall Restaurants) – led by the Stadshuskällaren restaurant and its banquet activities in the Blue Hall and the Golden Hall – were environmentally certified.

Follow the Nobel Week on Nobelprize.org
All Nobel Lectures will be webcast live on Nobelprize.org, the official website of the Nobel Foundation, and will later be available there in video-on-demand format. The Nobel Prize Award Ceremonies in Oslo and Stockholm will be webcast live at 13.00 and 16.30 CET, respectively, on December 10. During the Nobel Week, Nobel Media will conduct interviews with the Laureates, which will be published in video-on-demand format on Nobelprize.org. The television programme Nobel Minds, a co-production of Sveriges Television and BBC World on behalf of Nobel Media, will be available on Nobelprize.org. In this year’s edition of Nobel Minds, the discussion will be moderated by Zeinab Badawi of the BBC.

Material that will be published on Nobelprize.org (Central European Time, CET)
Detailed information memo on the Nobel Week for the press: December 5, 10.30
Seating chart for the Table of Honour at the Nobel Banquet: December 9, 14.00
Presentation speeches at the Nobel Prize Award Ceremony: December 10, 16.30

The menu for the Nobel Banquet: December 10, 19.00
Press photos of the menu and the divertissement: December 10, 21.30
The Laureates’ Banquet speeches: December 10, about 23.00

For further information on the Nobel Week programme and services for the media, please visit the Press Room for the Nobel Foundation and Nobel Media at Nobelprize.org/press.

Contact: Annika Pontikis, Public Relations Manager, Nobel Foundation
E-mail: annika.pontikis@nobel.se, tel: +46 8 663 14 70

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