Washington Performing Arts: Danish String Quartet

Franz Schubert — String Quartet No. 13 in A minor, D. 804, Op. 29 "Rosamunde"
Franz Schubert — String Quartet No. 12 in C minor, D. 703 "Quartettsatz"
Anna Thorvaldsdottir — Rituals
Franz Schubert — Gretchen am Spinnrade ("Gretchen at the spinning wheel"), D. 118 (arr. Danish String Quartet)

A hands-down Washington Performing Arts audience favorite, the Danish String Quartet members are rightly hailed both for their sterling technique and their adventurous approach to programming. Of a 2018 Washington Performing Arts performance, the Washington Post wrote, "They play with a cohesion, finesse, and precision second to none. Having built a solid reputation in the standard quartet repertory, recently they’ve turned their attention to Nordic folk music. The enthusiastic and vocal audience that packed the Sixth & I Historic Synagogue seemed glad they have."

For this Terrace Theater performance, the DSQ present a very different yet no less intriguing program, juxtaposing classic works by Schubert—the beloved "Rosamunde" quartet and a quartet arrangement of the lied Gretchen Am Spinnrade ("Gretchen at the Spinning Wheel")—with a new work co-commissioned by Washington Performing Arts from the esteemed contemporary Icelandic composer Anna Thorvaldsdottir. Of the previous quartet we co-commissioned from Ms. Thorvaldsdottir, Enigma, The New York Times wrote, "[Enigma] resembles dispatches emerging from the white noise of another world. It's a masterly entrance to the genre, and a deceptively vast soundscape conjured with just four acoustic instruments."

About Washington Performing Arts (D.C.)

https://www.washingtonperformingarts.org/

About Danish String Quartet

http://danishquartet.com/