It is said that the icons of the Orthodox churches of the East are something like windows to eternity, as they are intended to enable worshippers to come into direct contact with the saints depicted. Johann Sebastian Bach is certainly an icon of sacred music. Sebastian Heindl, a shooting star among German organists and appointed cantor of Berlin's Gedächtniskirche at the age of just 26, sets pieces by this baroque master in relation to contemporary compositions - including his own - which also open windows. Olivier Messiaen thus builds a church of heaven out of archaic sounds. Arvo Pärt looks back to the centuries-old tradition of the Catholic mass and Philip Glass works with expanding figurations that could theoretically grow into infinity.

Concert without intermission