Carnegie Hall

Celebrated for their “intense blend, extreme dynamic variation (in which they seem glued together), perfect intonation even on harmonics, and constant vitality and flow” (Gramophone), the members of the Danish String Quartet have become one of today’s most in-demand classical quartets. The ensemble formed when violinists Frederik Øland and Rune Tonsgaard Sørenson and violist Asbjørn Nørgaard were teenagers under the mentorship of Tim Frederiksen of Copenhagen’s Royal Danish Academy of Music.In 2008, the three Danes were joined by Norwegian cellist Fredrik Schøyen Sjölin. In the 2022–2023 season, the ensemble celebrated its 20th anniversary.

This season, the quartet completes its Doppelgänger series, an ambitious four-year international commissioning project that pairs world premieres from four composers—Bent Sørensen, Lotta Wennäkoski, Anna Thorvaldsdottir, and Thomas Adès—with late major chamber works by Schubert. In summer 2023, the quartet performed at the Ravinia Festival and Tanglewood’s Seiji Ozawa Hall. This season sees it tour to 18 cities in the US and Canada and venues in Norway, Germany, the UK, Netherlands, Belgium, Italy, and Denmark.

The Danish String Quartet’s most recent recording project is PRISM, a series of five discs on ECM New Series that explores the symbiotic musical and contextual relationships between J. S. Bach fugues, Beethoven string quartets, and works by Shostakovich, Schnittke, Bartók, Mendelssohn, and Webern. The final disc, PRISM V, was released to great acclaim in April 2023, with The Strad praising the quartet’s “refined, coherent, and erudite performances.” The ensemble has released two discs of traditional Scandinavian folk music: Wood Works (Dacapo, 2014) and Last Leaf (ECM, 2017).

The quartet members take an active role in reaching new audiences through special projects. In 2007, they established the DSQ Festival, which takes place in intimate and informal settings in Copenhagen. In 2016, they inaugurated a concert series, Series of Four, in which they perform and invite colleagues to appear.

The Danish String Quartet is the recipient of many awards and appointments, including Musical America’s 2020 Ensemble of the Year and a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award. In 2013, the quartet was named a BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artist and appointed to The Bowers Program at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. The quartet was awarded the 2010 NORDMETALL Ensemble Prize at the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival in Germany, and in 2011, it received the Carl Nielsen Prize, the highest cultural honor in Denmark.

Finnish cellist Johannes Rostamo is a versatile musician, interested in all forms of music from early Baroque to contemporary music and from jazz to folk music. Since 2008, he has served as principal cello of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, and since 2022, as professor of cello at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm. He also has an active career as a soloist, chamber musician, and Baroque musician. In addition, he is the artistic leader of the early music ensemble Orfeus Barock Stockholm, which presents a concert series at the Grünewald Hall in Stockholm.

Mr. Rostamo enjoys creating projects like CelloCelloCello, in which he presents the history of his instrument from the 17th century to today, using both Baroque and modern cellos. He is a founding member of the chamber music concept Stockholm Syndrome Ensemble, which experiments with concert form and collaborates with musicians and artists of all genres. Since 2011, this acclaimed group has performed concert series in Stockholm, and its albums Moveable Feast (Channel Classics) and Voices of Angels (BIS) both received the highest praise. During the summer, he is a regular guest at several major chamber music festivals in Europe.

As a soloist, Mr. Rostamo appears regularly with orchestras in the Nordic countries. His solo recording with Orfeus Barock Stockholm playing C. P. E. Bach’s Cello Concerto in A Minor received a Swedish Grammy nomination. Also, his recording of Joonas Kokkonen’s Cello Concerto with conductor Paul Mägi and Stockholm’s Royal College of Music Symphony Orchestra (live in Tallinn in 2006) was released by the Academus label.

In addition to his work in Stockholm, Mr. Rostamo is often invited to appear as guest principal cello in orchestras such as the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Australian Chamber Orchestra, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Les Siècles in Paris, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, and Camerata Bern. He is also a regular guest with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe.

Mr. Rostamo studied music in Helsinki, Stockholm, and Oslo, and at ECMA (European Chamber Music Academy) with professors Heikki Rautasalo, Torleif Thedéen, Truls Mørk, Frans Helmerson, and Hatto Beyerle. In addition, he studied Baroque cello with Emmanuel Balssa, Bruno Cocset, and Gaetano Nasillo. He plays a cello made by Antonio Stradivari in Cremona in 1698, generously loaned to him by Conni Jonsson. His Baroque cello was made by Lockey Hill in London in 1770.