Programme & Tickets

What roles should venues like the Konzerthaus Stadthalle play in the future? In the “Lounges” —the discussion series held during the festival weekends—guests from the worlds of culture and academia explore the festival’s theme, “Back Forward.” The audience is invited to participate in the discussion that follows.

"The audience makes the music" is the title of Sven Oliver Müller's study, which examines the behavior of classical music audiences in the European metropolises of the 19th century. The Berlin historian works out how citizens and aristocrats "communicate or fight each other through and in opera and concert performances". What kind of society did a venue like the Stadthalle Heidelberg, which opened in 1903, represent back then? And what has changed since then? Sven Oliver Müller looks back and forward.