Kronos Quartet: Tiny Desk Concert

VPM | By Tom Huizenga

Published March 23, 2026 at 9:00 AM EDT

We rarely invite the same band back to the Tiny Desk. But the beloved Kronos Quartet, which first played our offices 12 years ago, isn’t the same band. Three of the four members are brand new: Cellist Paul Wianko succeeded Suny Yang; violinist Gabriela Diaz and violist Ayane Kozasa replaced retiring original members John Sherba and Hank Dutt.

The newly rejuvenated quartet, still under the durable leadership of violinist and founder David Harrington, appears to be having more fun than ever. And it shows in these vigorous performances of pieces that are whimsical and socially conscious.

Neil Young wrote “Ohio” in the wake of the Kent State shootings in 1970, and Wianko’s new arrangement, with its jolts of defiance, reverberates disturbingly today. A similar urgency pervades Billie Holiday‘s staple “Strange Fruit,” which Harrington views as “the centerpiece of American music.” The quartet arrangement struts a melodramatic introduction that gracefully slips into the song’s languid despondency.

With over 1200 commissions of new pieces and arrangements, Kronos hasn’t lost its indefatigable drive to champion new music, including that of Canadian composer and video artist Nicole Lizée. Another Living Soul asks Kronos for more than strings. The effects of whirly tubes, groan tubes, bells and vocalizing, lend a playful feel. The composer describes the piece as “stop animation for string quartet.”

Kronos closes with commissioned music from Indonesian composer Peni Candra Rini, who includes the sounds of nature in “Hujan” (Rain), a piece which, despite its relaxed groove, laments climate change.

For over 50 years, Kronos has re-taught us how to listen to music, opening our ears to sounds from across the world, continually posing the question: What should a string quartet be in the 21st century?

SET LIST

Neil Young (arr. Wiancko): “Ohio”
Nicole Lizée: Another Living Soul
Abel Meeropol (arr. Garchik): “Strange Fruit”
Peni Candra Rini (arr. Garchik): “Hujan” (from Segara Gunung)

MUSICIANS

David Harrington: violin
Gabriela Diaz: violin
Ayane Kozasa: viola
Paul Wiancko: cello

TINY DESK TEAM

Producer: Tom Huizenga
Director/Editor: Maia Stern
Audio Engineer/Mix: Neil Tevault
Host/Series Producer: Bobby Carter
Videographers: Maia Stern, Joshua Bryant, Kara Frame
Audio Engineer: Josephine Nyounai
Production Assistants: Dhanika Pineda, Alina Edwards
Photographer: Bronson Arcuri
Tiny Desk Team: Ashley Pointer, Josh Newell
Series Editor: Lars Gotrich
Executive Producer: Suraya Mohamed
Executive Director: Sonali Mehta
Series Creators: Bob Boilen, Stephen Thompson, Robin Hilton

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Tom Huizenga

Tom Huizenga is a producer for NPR Music. He contributes a wide range of stories about classical music to NPR's news programs and is the classical music reviewer for All Things Considered. He appears regularly on NPR Music podcasts and founded NPR's classical music blog Deceptive Cadence in 2010.

Joining NPR in 1999, Huizenga produced, wrote and edited NPR's Peabody Award-winning daily classical music show Performance Today and the programs SymphonyCast and World of Opera.

He's produced live radio broadcasts from the Kennedy Center and other venues, including New York's (Le) Poisson Rouge, where he created NPR's first classical music webcast featuring the Emerson String Quartet.

As a video producer, Huizenga has created some of NPR Music's noteworthy music documentaries in New York. He brought mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato to the historic Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village, placed tenor Lawrence Brownlee and pianist Jason Moran inside an active crypt at a historic church in Harlem, and invited composer Philip Glass to a Chinatown loft to discuss music with Devonté Hynes (aka Blood Orange).

He has also written and produced radio specials, such as A Choral Christmas With Stile Antico, broadcast on stations around the country.

Prior to NPR, Huizenga served as music director for NPR member station KRWG, in Las Cruces, New Mexico, and taught in the journalism department at New Mexico State University.

Born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Huizenga's radio career began at the University of Michigan, where he produced and hosted a broad range of radio programs at Ann Arbor's WCBN-FM. He holds a B.A. from the University of Michigan in English literature and ethnomusicology.

See stories by Tom Huizenga