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Northern Lights Festival | Excelsior! and Nielsen

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Northern Lights Festival | Excelsior! and Nielsen

Saturday, April 18—Sunday, April 19, 2026

Saturday, April 18—Sunday, April 19, 2026
Orchestra Hall
2 hours
Tickets start at {{ vm.min_price_formatted }}

The DSO’s Northern Lights Festival continues with compositions from Sweden and Denmark. Norwegian violinist Eldbjørg Hemsing makes her DSO debut with an ethereal concerto by Anders Hillborg. Principal Guest Conductor Tabita Berglund, a Norwegian native, also leads the orchestra in the dramatic interplay of contrasts in Nielsen’s Fifth.

Program

STENHAMMAR
Excelsior!
ANDERS HILLBORG
Violin Concerto No. 2
NIELSEN
Symphony No. 5

Artists

Tabita Berglund

conductor

Tabita Berglund is one of today’s most exciting, talented and in-demand young conductorswho has gained a reputation for her alert, charismatic and inspiring style, which elicits“exceptional music-making” (The Arts Desk). This season, Berglund begins her four-yeartenure as Principal Guest Conductor of Detroit Symphony Orchestra, and from the 2025–26 season, she holds the same title with Dresdner Philharmonie; she was appointed toeach position following her respective debut.

Symphonic highlights of the 2024–25 season include debuts with the Houston Symphony,Minnesota Orchestra, Gothenburg Symphony, Gürzenich-Orchester Köln, Orchestre dechambre de Paris, Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Iceland SymphonyOrchestra, and Lahti Symphony Orchestra, as well as Berglund’s inaugural weeks as DetroitSymphony Orchestra’s Principal Guest Conductor—the first featuring the US premiere ofAnna Clyne’s violin concerto Time and Tides with fellow HarrisonParrott artist PekkaKuusisto. Other notable season highlights include Berglund’s Asian debut with TokyoMetropolitan Symphony Orchestra, her Salzburg Easter Festival debut togetherwith Mozarteum Orchester Salzburg, a European tour with Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana,and returns to Dresdner Philharmonie, Royal Stockholm PhilharmonicOrchestra, Orchestre national de Lyon, Tonkünstler-Orchester Niederösterreich, andTrondheim Symphony Orchestra. In December 2024, she conducts The NorwegianNational Ballet in 12 performances of Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker.

Berglund regularly collaborates with internationally renowned soloists; recent andupcoming partnerships include Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Leila Josefowicz, Truls Mørk, CédricTiberghien, Nicolas Altstaedt, Håkan Hardenberger, Alexander Malofeev, the Jussenbrothers, and Camilla Tilling, to name a few. In 2024–25, she continues to champion themusic of Nordic compatriots such as Thorvaldsdottir, Saariaho, Sibelius, Svendsen, andIrgens Jensen, as part of a wide-ranging repertoire from Mozart and Beethoven to Dvořák,Mussorgsky, Poulenc, Lutosławski, and Britten, among many others.

Recent engagements include appearances with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, DetroitSymphony Orchestra, Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Finnish Radio SymphonyOrchestra, Dresdner Philharmonie, Philharmonia Orchestra, Orchestre national deLyon, Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra, Berner Symphonieorchester, City of BirminghamSymphony Orchestra, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, and Düsseldorfer Symphoniker,among many others. Festival appearances include Festival Internacional de Músicay Danza de Granada and Grafenegg. Additionally, Berglund made her Garsington Operadebut in summer 2024, conducting a revival production of Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro. Sheconcluded her three-year tenure as Principal Guest Conductor of Kristiansand SymphonyOrchestra at the end of the 2023–24 season. In August 2024, she chaired the jury for thegrand finale of the Eurovision Young Musicians competition, broadcast live on televisionthroughout Europe via the major networks.

Berglund studied at the Norwegian Academy of Music, first as a cellist with Truls Mørk andlater orchestral conducting with Ole Kristian Ruud. She played regularly with the Oslo andBergen Philharmonic orchestras, as well as the Trondheim Soloists, before conductingbecame her main focus. Her debut album, with Oslo Philharmonic and violinist SonokoMiriam Welde, was released in 2021 (LAWO) and nominated for a Norwegian Grammy(Spellemann) in the 2022 Classical Music category.

HarrisonParrott represents Tabita Berglund for worldwide general management.

Eldbjørg Hemsing

violin

One of the most charismatic and leading young violinists on the international scene today, Eldbjørg Hemsing is acclaimed for her “radiant and sophisticated performances” (BBC Music Magazine) and is a musician committed to bringing her art form to new and emerging audiences across the globe. Her international career took off quickly, leading to four award-winning albums and world premieres of numerous compositions in many of the greatest halls of the world.

The 2023/24 season sees her appear with Iceland Symphony Orchestra under Yan Pascal Tortelier and return to Trondheim Symfoniorkester, alongside engagements with Den Norske Opera and Xi'an Symphony Orchestra. In addition to classical repertoire, Eldbjørg Hemsing is strongly dedicated to contemporary Nordic music, and will perform Anders Hillborg's Violin Concerto No.2 with Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra and Esa-Pekka Salonen, a project that follows last season's recording of Rolf Wallin's Whirld Violin Concerto with Stavanger Symphony Orchestra under Andris Poga. Duo recitals and chamber music programmes in trio with Daniel Müller-Schott and Martin Stadtfeld take her to Germany for the Dresden Music Festival and the Heidelberger Frühling Festival, to Bærum in Norway and to the US.

Recent highlights include performances of Mozart’s Violin Concerto No.3 with Orchestre National d’Île de France, Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto with Oslo Philharmonic and Bruch’s Violin Concerto with Philharmonia Orchestra under Santtu-Mathias Rouvali. Eldbjørg Hemsing regularly collaborates with orchestras such as Bergen Philharmonic, Belgian National Orchestra, MDR Sinfonieorchester Leipzig, Shanghai and Hong Kong philharmonic orchestras, and is a welcome guest at prestigious venues such as Lincoln Center New York, the Kennedy Center Washington, Wigmore Hall, Verbier Festival and the National Center for the Performing Arts in Beijing.

She has also performed at numerous major global events and venues such as the Nobel Peace Prize Ceremony in Oslo, United Nations, Shanghai Expo, and the UN Security Council. She has developed a close collaboration with the composer Tan Dun with whom she has premiered, toured, and recorded several award-winning works. She is a passionate speaker on the power of classical music beyond its traditional borders.

Eldbjørg Hemsing’s first album on Sony Classical with Arctic Philharmonic and Christian Kluxen, Arctic, was released in February 2023 and is devoted to the rich natural soundscapes of the Arctic. After an astonishing five nominations, the album gained her an Opus Klassik Award in the category Classic without Limits. Her current discography of critically acclaimed recordings includes an album of Grieg's violin sonatas on BIS, which won the Spellemann Prize in Norway as Recording of the Year 2020. Her second album, Fire Ritual, centers around Tan Dun’s Violin Concerto, composed for and premiered by Eldbjørg Hemsing, and her debut album in 2018 featured Hjalmar Borgström’s Violin Concerto and Shostakovich’s Violin Concerto No.1, recorded with the Wiener Symphoniker and Olari Elts.

A musical entrepreneur, Hemsing is actively involved in a multitude of projects, all rooted in her passionate interest to bring classical music to a more mainstream audience. As Senior Artistic Advisor of the prestigious global research firm Advisory Board for the Arts she spearheads ventures to bring transformative thinking to arts organisations and artists. She co-founded the Hemsing Festival and is the Artistic Director of the SPIRE, an innovative annual competition to promote and nurture young artists in their artistic and personal self-development in the classical music world.

Born in Valdres, Norway, Eldbjørg Hemsing studied at the prestigious Barratt Due Institute of Music in Oslo and with Professor Boris Kuschnir in Vienna. She plays a 1707 Antonio Stradivari 'Rivaz, Baron Gutmann' violin, on loan from the Dextra Musica Foundation.

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