Some of the most famous music in figure skating came from the Olympics: Ravel's Boléro for Torvill and Dean in 1984, Carmen for Katarina Witt in 1988, Seimei for Yuzuru Hanyu in 2018 and Donna Summer's MacArthur Park for Alysa Liu in 2026. The choices changed a lot once singles and pairs skaters were allowed lyrics from the 2014-15 season. Here are the stories behind the music people remember.
Key takeaways
- For most of skating's history, singles and pairs skaters couldn't use lyrics, which is why classical music and film scores filled the Olympic programs of the past.
- Ice dancers have been allowed vocals since the 1997-98 season, and singles and pairs since 2014-15. Pyeongchang 2018 was the first Olympics where every discipline could use them.
- Calgary 1988 had two Olympic medalists skating to Carmen in the same free skate, which is how it became the "Battle of the Carmens".
- Alysa Liu won the 2026 Olympic title skating to a song by Laufey in her short program and Donna Summer's MacArthur Park in her free.
- Music rights are now part of the job: a Spanish skater nearly lost his Minions program days before the Milan Games.
Hum the opening of Boléro to a skating fan and there's a good chance they'll picture two skaters in purple, kneeling on the ice. That's how strongly a few Olympic programs have tied themselves to their music. This page goes through the pieces people remember most, roughly in order, and what made each one work.
Why the music matters
Music isn't background in figure skating. Judges mark how well a program is built around its music and how well the skater interprets it, through the composition and presentation components of the score. The music also decides where the jumps and spins can sit, so it shapes the whole program. Our page on how Olympic skating is scored explains where those marks fit.
For decades the rules narrowed the choices too. Singles and pairs skaters couldn't use music with lyrics until the 2014-15 season, so their programs leaned on classical pieces, opera and film scores. Our article on the music rules of figure skating covers how that rule worked and how it ended.
The classical years
Boléro, Sarajevo 1984. Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean skated their free dance to Ravel's Boléro and earned twelve perfect 6.0s, nine of them for artistic impression. The music was too long even after cutting, so they began on their knees and didn't put a blade on the ice for about 18 seconds, because the timing only started once they were skating. It's one of the cleverest bits of program planning in Olympic history.
Carmen, Calgary 1988. Katarina Witt of East Germany and Debi Thomas of the United States both skated their free programs to Bizet's Carmen, and the press called it the "Battle of the Carmens". Witt won her second Olympic title, Elizabeth Manley of Canada took silver, and Thomas won bronze.
Lyra Angelica, Nagano 1998. Michelle Kwan skated her free program to Lyra Angelica, a concerto for harp and string orchestra by the English composer William Alwyn. It's gentle music for a big Olympic moment, and Kwan took silver behind Tara Lipinski. Her program is still one of the most loved in Olympic skating.
Film and stage music
The Man in the Iron Mask, Salt Lake City 2002. Alexei Yagudin won gold with a free skate set to music from the film The Man in the Iron Mask. Four of the nine judges gave him a perfect 6.0 for presentation, and every judge placed him first. Film scores like this one gave skaters big, dramatic music without breaking the no-lyrics rule.
Seimei, Pyeongchang 2018. Yuzuru Hanyu built his free skate on music by Shigeru Umebayashi from the 2001 Japanese film Onmyoji, playing the 10th-century court diviner Abe no Seimei. He first skated it in 2015-16, when he broke the free skate world record several times, and brought it back for the Olympic season. He won his second Olympic title with it, a few months after an ankle injury.
Moulin Rouge, Pyeongchang 2018. Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir skated their free dance to music from Moulin Rouge, including El Tango de Roxanne and Come What May. They won gold with a world record total, by 0.79 points. As ice dancers they'd been allowed vocals for years, and the film's songs gave the program a story the audience already knew.
Gershwin, Vancouver 2010. Not every classic came from a film. Yuna Kim of South Korea skated her free program to George Gershwin's Piano Concerto in F and set world records for the free skate and the total. It showed that a concert piece can carry an Olympic free skate just as well as a famous soundtrack.
When lyrics arrived
Ice dancers were allowed vocal music from the 1997-98 season, and singles and pairs skaters from 2014-15. That made the 2018 Pyeongchang Games the first Olympics where every discipline could skate to lyrics. Since then, pop songs, musical theater and rock have become ordinary at every level.
Rocketman, Beijing 2022. Nathan Chen won gold with a free skate to Elton John's music from the film Rocketman, landing five quads. At the same Games he set a short program world record of 113.97.
Laufey and MacArthur Park, Milano Cortina 2026. Alysa Liu skated her short program to a song by the Icelandic singer Laufey, who posted her delight online afterward. For the free skate, Liu chose Donna Summer's MacArthur Park. The song had been suggested to her, and she said finding the 16-minute suite version "took it to another level". She won gold with it, and the song's writer, Jimmy Webb, said he was proud to have played a part.
Music stories from Milano Cortina
Lyrics opened up a huge library of popular music, and with it the question of rights. Skaters now license their music through the ISU's ClicknClear system. Spain's Tomàs-Llorenç Guarino Sabaté found out the Friday before the Games that his Minions program wasn't cleared. After a public outcry Universal agreed, and the last piece, Pharrell Williams' Freedom, was approved about two hours before the figure skating began.
He finished 25th in the short program, one place short of the free skate, but he got to skate as a Minion at the Olympics. The other music talking point came from ice dance. Czech siblings Kateřina Mrázková and Daniel Mrázek skated their rhythm dance partly to an AI-generated track in the style of 1990s Bon Jovi. It broke no ISU rule, but it drew a lot of criticism from fans and writers.
The music at a glance
Here are the pieces from this page in one place. Results are for the event each program was skated in.
| Music | Skater | Games | Result |
|---|---|---|---|
| Boléro (Ravel) | Torvill and Dean | Sarajevo 1984 | Gold |
| Carmen (Bizet) | Katarina Witt; Debi Thomas | Calgary 1988 | Gold; bronze |
| Lyra Angelica (Alwyn) | Michelle Kwan | Nagano 1998 | Silver |
| The Man in the Iron Mask | Alexei Yagudin | Salt Lake City 2002 | Gold |
| Piano Concerto in F (Gershwin) | Yuna Kim | Vancouver 2010 | Gold |
| Seimei (Umebayashi, from Onmyoji) | Yuzuru Hanyu | Pyeongchang 2018 | Gold |
| Moulin Rouge | Virtue and Moir | Pyeongchang 2018 | Gold |
| Rocketman (Elton John) | Nathan Chen | Beijing 2022 | Gold |
| MacArthur Park (Donna Summer) | Alysa Liu | Milano Cortina 2026 | Gold |
Choosing music for your own skating
The thread running through all of these is fit. Each piece suited the skater's style and gave the program a shape, a build, a story or a mood the audience could follow. That's as true for a first adult program as it is for an Olympic free skate, and you don't need a famous piece to get it right.
If you're picking music for a program, our guide to choosing music for your skating program walks through it, including timing and editing. If you compete, sort out what music your event accepts and how to license it before you spend months choreographing. For the performances themselves, our page on the best Olympic performances has more of the stories.
Sources
Program music and results come from official Olympic results and reporting from each Games. Where sources disagreed about a piece, we left it out.
- Olympics.com, Torvill and Dean steal hearts on Valentine's Day, and Classic FM on the Boléro edit and kneeling start.
- Wikipedia, Battle of the Carmens, and UPI's report from Calgary (February 1988).
- NPR, Skating upset (February 1998).
- Dawn and the Lawrence Journal-World on the 2002 men's event.
- Kyoto Shimbun on Seimei (March 2018), and Shigeru Umebayashi's site.
- Olympics.com, Virtue and Moir smash record for gold, and Eurosport (Reuters) on the free dance music.
- Christian Science Monitor on Yuna Kim's record free skate (February 2010), and AP on Nathan Chen's 2022 gold.
- NBC New York, Laufey's reaction to Alysa Liu's skate, NBC Bay Area, Alysa Liu on her music (March 2026), and ABC Audio on Jimmy Webb.
- AP, Spanish skater says it's amazing to bring Minions to Olympic ice after music dispute (February 2026).
- TechCrunch, Czech ice dancers skate to AI music at the Olympics (February 2026).
