DR Vokalensemble

The DR Radio Choir turns 75 in 2007, an event being marked in an appropriate fashion throughout the year. In the 70 years since DR set up a chamber choir, it has changed its name several times, before settling on the name 'Vocal Ensemble' in January 2007.

The choir has toured Denmark and most of Europe, as well as Australia, the USA and Canada. It has released a number of a cappella CDs featuring Romantic and contemporary music.

One high point was the performance of Stockhausen's 'Weltparlament', when Copenhagen was European City of Culture. he Vocal Ensemble's first season since its inception in January 2007 stretches from a castle in Sealand to rain forests and urban jungles to the Ålborg Opera Festival 2008.

Indeed, the Ensemble will spend a great deal of time performing around Denmark and the South of Sweden. The season started with the traditional castle concerts at Ledreborg along with the Danish Radio Concert Orchestra,

before progressing to the Danish Radio Concert Hall, where they will sing music from the Danish Golden Age, conducted by Michael Bojesen. In January 2008, the ensemble will take part in a series of concerts called 'From rain forest to urban jungle”.

The regular choirmaster Fredrik Malmberg, who has a great interest in the more unusual parts of the world of music, proposed this series of performances. The somewhat unusual name covers classics and contemporary music from both American continents.

Malmberg does not only concentrate on unknown music – he has also found time to mark the 300th anniversary of the death of Diderich Buxtehude with a series of concerts in Copenhagen and Malmø. In the autumn 2007, the Vocal Ensemble and the Radio Concert Hall will host a visit by the young Dutch star conductor Peter Dijkstra, who is head conductor for both the Bavarian Radio Choir and the Swedish Radio Choir.

He will conduct a Saturday concert featuring songs by Brahms and Richard Strauss. In April, the Ensemble's 1st guest conductor, Stephen Layton from England, will present a Poulenc programme.

In spring 2008, the Ensemble and the Aalborg Symphony Orchestra will work together on a youth project, and the Ensemble will be ’choir in residence’ at the Aalborg Opera Festival 2008. The Vocal Ensemble will round off the season by taking part in the 'World Symposium for Choir Music' in Copenhagen, July 2008.