Danish String Quartet Return for a Bicoastal U.S. Tour with the Danish National Girls’ Choir, Featuring a Premiere by David Lang

The program’s first half celebrates powerful women through the centuries, from a 12th-century Danish queen to living Scandinavian composers and songwriters. 

April 10–18, 2026

Santa Barbara, Costa Mesa, La Jolla, Stanford, New York City, and Washington DC

"I remain at a loss to explain how these four musicians create such pathos from a simple old folk tune. Their arrangement gives it an almost Beethovenian depth of feeling — sadness and joy turning inescapably into each another. "
—The New York Times 

"...an ensemble whose affinity for all the corners of the standard canon is only matched by their enthusiasm for Nordic folk music...their feel for its style, total grasp of all of the musical elements, exuberant virtuosity, and sheer vigor – rewards repeated listening."
—The ArtsFuse

For interviews, contact Beverly Greenfield
Director of Public Relations, Kirshbaum Associates
bgreenfield@kirshbaumassociates.com

New York, NY: March 3, 2026 — The GRAMMY-nominated Danish String Quartet (DSQ), known for their innovative programming and their affinity for both European classical works and the traditional folk tunes of their homeland, return to the U.S. this spring for a coast-to-coast tour with the Danish National Girls’ Choir, part of the Danish National Broadcasting Corporation (DR). The DR Pigekoret (as they are known in Danish) is one of Denmark’s most revered musical institutions and considered one of the world’s best girls’ choirs. The two award-winning ensembles are longtime collaborators, having performed together in the U.S. and Europe; this tour represents their highest-profile collaboration to date and their first bicoastal U.S. tour. The tour features both the U.S. and New York Premieres of in wildness by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer David Lang, as well as a transcendent blend of other contemporary works, reimagined classics, and traditional Nordic folk songs. 

On paper, a girls’ choir and a string quartet may seem refined, even traditional. But we have never been interested in refinement for its own sake. We have pursued a tangible and raw power, insisting on presenting the fragile and uncompromising side by side - as well as the intimate and the fierce. This concert has evolved from this shared curiosity, harnessing the power of a string quartet and a girls’ choir - and the collective force that emerges when multiple voices meet - creating movement and transformation.
--From the Program Statement 

“The Danish are remarkable, as ever – capable of intense blend, extreme dynamic variation (in which they seem glued together), perfect intonation even on harmonics, and constant vitality and flow.”
—Gramophone

"Once a Shoemaker" featured on NPR's playlist of "124 Best Songs of 2024"
—National Public Radio

David Lang's in wildness receives its U.S. Premiere on April 10 at the University of California Santa Barbara, presented by UCSB Arts and Lectures, and its New York Premiere on April 17 at Carnegie Hall’s Zankel Hall. The piece sets excerpts from American philosopher Henry David Thoreau’s 1851 essay “Walking,” interspersed with snippets from two poems by Danish author Hans Christian Andersen. Thoreau’s essay, which Lang first read in high school, is an exploration of the lessons we can learn about society and ourselves by walking through the wilderness. “The ‘wildness’ that Thoreau writes about in ‘Walking’ is as much a political wildness as it is a personal or metaphoric one,” writes Lang in his program note for the piece. Rather than setting the texts exactly as written, Lang chose to amend and rework them to suit a more modern context. “I hoped that converting these texts into a hopeful, direct address, from a group of modern, committed young women, might make these messages easier for us to hear, to pay attention to, and to believe,” he says.

The piece is written especially for our two ensembles, and it is an extraordinary honor to present new music by one of the most significant composers of our time. in wildness draws inspiration from the writings of Henry David Thoreau and Hans Christian Andersen - two poets who, each in their own way and language, describe a movement away from established society and into nature, into the unknown. Not as an escape, but as a possibility. As a way of imagining a different world, and a different future.
--From the Program Statement

Opening with a new arrangement for girls’ choir of Caroline Shaw’s Allemande from her Pulitzer Prize-winning Partita for 8 Voices, the first half of the touring program is a celebration of powerful women composers and figures throughout history. “We will meet an early Danish power lady, Queen Dagmar from the 12th century, and we will hear the cracking voice of Marie Tang Kristensen, a Danish housewife, whose songs were captured on wax cylinders back in 1907,” says the Danish String Quartet in their statement on the program. “We will also hear the voices of composers such as Anna Thorvaldsdottir, Lotta Wennäkoski and Danish electronic musician Astrid Sonne, interspersed with traditional songs and tunes that surrounded us when we grew up in Denmark.”

Danish National Girls' Choir
Founded in 1938, the Danish National Girls’ Choir, under the patronage of Her Majesty Queen Mary of Denmark, is known throughout Denmark from its thousands of broadcasts on radio and television, including its annual New Year’s Eve concert, through which millions of Danes have sung in the new year together with the choir. Denmark has a strong choral tradition going back centuries; the Danish National Girls’ Choir combines old song traditions with new music. “The sound of the young female voices is pure and Nordic, with a contemporary rhythmic touch,” according to Danish publication Politiken. Danish String Quartet violist Asbjørn Nørgaard, meanwhile, describes the choir as having “an almost tangible power” and originality that makes it the perfect partner for the bold visions of the Quartet. 

Danish String Quartet
Biography
Press Quotes
Photos & Digital Press Kit

APRIL 10-18, 2026
Danish String Quartet | Danish National Girls’ Choir
New Work by David Lang

PROGRAM**

Caroline Shaw: Allemande from Partita for 8 Voices
Lotta Wennäkoski: Pige (Girl)
Franz Schubert: Theme from “Death and the Maiden,” D.810
Anna Thorvaldsdottir (arr. Thomas Bryla): "Þann heilaga kross"
Trad (arr.  Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen): "Kisti du kom"
Trad (arr.  Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen): "Dronning Dagmar ligger udi Ribe syg"
Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen: Once a Shoemaker
Astrid Sonne: "How far"
Caroline Shaw (arr. Charlotte Rowan): "And so"
Turlough O’ Carolan (arr. Fredrik Sjölin): "Captain O’Kane"
Carl Nielsen/Ingemann (arr. Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen): "Tit er jeg glad og et brudestykke"
David Lang: in wildness*

*David Lang’s in wildness was co-commissioned by the Danish String Quartet, Danish National Girls’ Choir, Arts & Lectures at the University of California Santa Barbara, La Jolla Music Society, Philharmonic Society of Orange County, Stanford Live, Carnegie Hall, and Washington Performing Arts Society.

**Except April 14 - See Below

U.S. TOUR DATES, April 10-18, 2026

Friday, April 10
Santa Barbara, CA | UCSB Arts and Lectures
Tickets & Venue Information 

Saturday, April 11
Costa Mesa, CA | Philharmonic Society of Orange County
Tickets & Venue Information

Sunday, April 12
La Jolla, CA | La Jolla Music Society
Tickets & Venue Information

**Tuesday, April 14 - DANISH STRING QUARTET ONLY
San Francisco, CA | San Francisco Performances
STRAVINSKY (arr. DSQ): Suite Italienne
SCHNITTKE: String Quartet No. 2
Original compositions & traditional tunes arranged by DSQ
Tickets & Venue Information

Wednesday, April 15
Stanford, CA | Stanford Live
Tickets & Venue Information

Friday, April 17
New York, NY | Carnegie Hall's Zankel Hall
Tickets & Venue Information

Saturday, April 18
Washington, DC | Washington Performing Arts
Tickets & Venue Information