Stéphane Tran Ngoc and Anne Ngoc Søe -Duo Ngoc- have been performing together since 2019. They have given concerts in Europe, Asia, and Australia.
Their recording of Berio's 34 duets will be released on April 26, 2026.
Short and expressive, these duets offer a modern sound comparable to a visit to the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art or the Tate Modern. Luciano Berio composed these 34 violin duets between 1979 and 1983 to introduce the younger generation of violinists to new modern techniques. Each duo is dedicated to an important person in Berio's life—their first name serving as the title of the piece—including Béla (Bartók), Igor (Stravinsky), and Pierre (Boulez). The recording was made in 2025, the centenary of Luciano Berio's birth, in the exceptional acoustics of the Concert Church in the heart of Nørrebro, Copenhagen.
During their concerts in Australia, Vietnam, France, and Denmark, Berio's duets have graced the programs between longer works by Prokofiev, Stravinsky, and Paganini. The public's enthusiasm for Berio prompted them to record these pieces.
The Sequenza VIII for solo violin, featuring Stéphane Tran Ngoc on violin, is the final and longest piece on the recording, at 13 minutes. Composed as a tribute to Bach's Ciaccona in D minor for solo violin, it dramatically depicts the cycle of life.
Anne Ngoc Søe is recognized as one of Denmark’s most accomplished and dedicated musicians in contemporary music. She began playing the violin at the age of four, using the Suzuki method. At the age of fifteen, she won the Gold Medal at the Berlingske Music Competition for her performance of Paganini’s Violin Concerto and represented Denmark at a Eurovision concert. That same year, she began her studies at the Royal Danish Academy of Music in Milan Vitek’s violin class. She later studied with Marta Líbalová in Aarhus and with the renowned violinist Ruggiero Ricci in Salzburg. Søe made her debut in 1991 and has a diverse repertoire as a soloist, with a particular interest in contemporary music. In recent years, she has premiered several notable violin concertos, including Morten Olsen’sThe Heart of Darkness in 2019, and Tyler Futrell’s Fresh Air in 2020, both with the Athelas Sinfonietta. In 2020, her rendition of Karl Aage Rasmussen’s violin concerto Sinking Through the Dream Mirror was released on the critically acclaimed album Alone & Together by Dacapo Records. Anne Ngoc Søe is a member of the Copenhagen Phil and has been teaching at the Royal Danish Academy of Music since 2008. She serves as the concertmaster of the Athelas Sinfonietta and has recorded numerous albums with the ensemble.
