Wood Works

I just recently learned and found the Danish String Quartet, one through a feature in a magazine and then through NPR radio playing their music. I was leaning towards this Wood Works album being of Scandinavian influences in the traditional folk sense, Norwegian myself and loving the music classical and traditional. What a treat and delight this album is! The album starts off in a haunting tone, reflective and sets the Scandinavian spirit in a dark yet beautiful mood. Then it moves on from there with spirited dances, jigs, and tradtional folk tones, some even will recognize who are familiar with Scandinavian music. In fact I can't stop playing the album, the groups playing is fantastic and evokes the feelings and sounds of Norway, Sweden, Denmark so very well. Its like a traditional Scandinavian koltbord or smorgasbord filled with moving material and a fresh sound for these old pieces and stories that are living within them. What has me so impressed is its a string quartet playing traditional tunes, yet while listening you forget its a string quartet. I can't recommend this album enough. I would love to see a follow up album to this one, they cover the Scandinavian feelings and sounds so well and you can tell by the playing that they enjoy what they do and have the knowledge and care for the music they are showcasing and sharing. Thank you Danish String Quartet, amazing job, more please!

A risk in globalization is the deterioration or disappearance of cultural aspects that have ancient and unique characteristics like launguages and folk music. Even in the “classical” genre, grafting such folk melodies was fairly common albeit in small doses. Here the Danes continue this tradition seen in early composers like Haydn, Beethoven, Dvorak, Liszt grafting in Hungarian folk fragments but especially in the lifelong work of Bartok with Kodaly. As such the music tends more simple, peasant, organic. It is a place for imperfect and community celebration, not individual, perfected virtuosity. You feel such spirit in what the Danish Quartet brings. It comes off well and makes a broadening repertoire beyond the well-known classical quartets of Beethoven, Brahms, Schubert, and Shostakovich. Much credit to these Danes for their tasteful, spirited performances that feel more like a impromptu pub performance than a over-produced recording studio session. Plus some surprise “guest” instruments bring an unexpected twist to the music. Their instruments sound rich, earthy, clear and balanced. Compositions - 4 stars; Performance - 5 stars; Sound quality - 5 stars.

A very short history of popular Scandinavian music in America: Rosenfole (1989); Nordisk San (1991); The Sweet Sunny North (Vol 1, 1994; Vol 2, 1996]; Septentrio (2013), and now (2014) Wood Works. The Danish String Quartet, a classical ensemble, arranged Swedish, Norwegian, and Danish traditional and folk songs and dances to produce a beautiful, sweet, haunting, and somewhat melancholic album, even when the dances swirl and jump. Most of the folk music in this region centers on the fiddle; thus, it is appropriate for a quartet to expand the harmonies and embellish the simple melodies. Ditties now are transformed into quasi sonatas, rondos, chaconnes, and renaissance gigues. [I really do not know the musical structures, but you get the drift.] A flugelhorn makes a guest appearance in track 7, Five Sheep, Four Goats. Counterpoint and jazzlike swing follow in a contemporary piece, O Fredrik, O Fredrik. The schottis, is a rhythm that alludes to Scotland; this wide European musical style is the dance of track 12, which came to Norway from Germany. Go figure. Wood Works is a wonderful album that will please world music fans as well as classical music enthusiasts. This unique fusion is charming.

This collection of songs is so well arranged and so well executed that it seems impossible to have emanated from 4 separate people. While I have no doubt that they always work hard to perfect their individual parts of the performances, the end result gives the impression that they play together with one mind. Some songs sound as old as civilization itself, and reverberate in the soul. Others have a modern flair that feels edgy, lively and fun.These men are very well known for their classical talents. This rarer side of their personalities is one of the most charming recreations of living history I've ever experienced in a single album.If nothing else, it's a perfect companion for sitting next to the fire with a hot cup of coffee, watching through the window as snow falls and swirls outside. Who knows better than the Scandinavians about hygge.

DANISH STRING QUARTET. Wood Works. DaCapo. 2014. $14.95. Rune Tonsgaard Sorensen, Frederik Oland, violin; Asjberg Norgaard, viola; Fredrik Schoyen Sjolin, cello.“Folk music is the music of everywhere and everyone.” That’s the first sentence in the liner notes to Wood Works, a musically charming, tasteful and thoroughly well played homage to Scandinavian folk music. The variety of the pieces played is astonishing to someone like me, who has no prior experience with this music at all. (Actually, that’s not quite true. I did recognize “Ack Varmeland, du skona,” but only because I have it on two jazz albums under the title “Dear Old Stockholm.”) There are reels, waltzes, jigs and polkas, and one piece (“O Fredrik, O Fredrick”) that sounds at first like the Kronos Quartet playing Steve Reich. Some of the pieces are subdued and lyrical (cf. especially the three parts of the “Sonderho Bridal Trilogy”), others rollicking and rowdy. They even comment about “the funky possibilities” of the dance, “Old Reinlender from Sonndala,” which sounds like a particularly muscular schottische. This is one of the best albums of music I have heard in a long time. Everything is perfect in it: their choice of tunes, the harmonious blending and echoing of the violins, viola and cello, and above all, the musicians’ inspired decision to give their not always so simple native music an audience.

This young but confident string quartet, alongside standard classical repertoire, offer listeners distinctive Nordic music in the traditional/classic crossover genre. The members play in other combos when not working in this quartet. This album is full of subtle ensemble playing and shimmers with many attractive string effects, offering the listener earworms that will play in his or her head all day. Much of the content is very rhythmic as the players achive a distinct tempo entirely by the use of their string instruments. In one track, a Miles Davis-style trumpet augments the strings, to very good effect. I would have liked some more of that. On the next album, perhaps.

I really enjoyed the cd which was recommended to me. Although for some reason I expected it to be more classical than folk music, but please don’t let this put you off buying it as it really was very good value for money and extremely enjoyable to listen to. I haven’t had a chance to listen to the latest cd yet but have heard it described as love for the ears so I am eagerly awaiting the time to sit back and just absorb the beauty of the music. I hope you do too!!

This album is brilliant in both concept and execution. Nordic folk music is reimagined and played by a string quartet - with the occasional intervention of flugelhorn. The Danish String Quartet achieves a great purity of sound, but at the same time they retain the warmth and the immediacy of the folk tunes which - as they say - they have "borrowed" for the occasion. On first listening one is struck with the sense of spontaneity - as if the quarter and you as the listener are discovering this music for the first time. Then you realise just how carefully thought through this project is, just how deeply these "classical" musicians are steeped in their "folk" music.

I heard this quartet on Radio 3 playing a track from this CD and was bowled over. The whole album has lived up to that first audition. It’s beautifully played and there is a wonderful range of moods. I have played it many times and never tire of it. Recording quality is really good too. It’s just marvellous and I cannot recommend it too highly.

Bought as a gift for my wife, who likes it very much because of the beautiful playing and arrangements.