Heidelberger Frühling

 

The 29th Heidelberger Frühling Musikfestival will take place from 22 March to 13 April 2025 under the motto “Liberated Time”. This third edition with pianist Igor Levit as Co-Artistic Director alongside Artistic Director Thorsten Schmidt will feature 82 events at 18 venues in Heidelberg between March and April. One highlight is the only German performance of all five piano concertos by Sergei Prokofiev on three evenings by Igor Levit with the Budapest Festival Orchestra conducted by Iván Fischer. The venue for these concerts is the Heidelberg Congress Center, which the 2025 music festival is using as a venue for the first time with a total of six concerts.

 

The festival will also host artists such as Gabriela Montero, Rolando Villazón, Isabelle Faust, Augustin Hadelich, Lisa Batiashvili, Philippe Herreweghe, Jörg Widmann, Sarah Willis, Lukas Sternath and Veronika Eberle as well as internationally renowned ensembles and orchestras such as the Orchestre des Champs-Élysées, the London Symphony Orchestra, the Die Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, the Zürcher Kammerorchester, Il Pomo d'Oro, the Vision String Quartet and the Cuarteto Casals. The Festivalcampus-Ensemble of young up-and-coming musicians will perform 16 concerts with self-curated programmes – including ten re:start concerts in Heidelberg's districts with free admission.

 

The quartet festival Heidelberger Frühling Streichquartettfest from 23 to 26 January 2025 will focus on the German composer Helmut Lachenmann on the occasion of his 90th birthday. In total, Heidelberger Frühling is offering around 125 events in the festivals, concert series and Liedakademie in the 2024/25 season. “Liberated Time” is the motto of the 2025 Heidelberger Frühling Musikfestival, which aims to stage musical events and bring the phenomenon of time in music to life in a particularly impressive way. One focus of the programme is on Franz Schubert and his works with an original use of time – from the late E flat major piano trio to the famous string quintet and the C major symphony.

 

The second focus composer of the 2025 festival edition also works with time in an unmistakable way: Steve Reich. With “Drumming” for percussion and “Different Trains” for string quartet, two of his main minimal music works are on the programme. With the motto “Liberated Time”, the 2025 music festival would also like to invite the public to take a three-week break from everyday life through music. The music festival is therefore taking the time for complete performances of several groups of works: In addition to Sergei Prokofiev's five piano concertos, these include above all the six string quintets by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.Based on the festival motto, the Festivalcampus-Ensemble of twelve up-and-coming musicians develops its own concert and programme concepts, supported by coaches and inspiring artistic personalities. The musicians present themselves in six concert programmes as an ensemble and in smaller formations both in the main venues and again as central players in the re:start concerts in Heidelberg's districts.

 

The main venues of the 2025 Heidelberger Frühling Musikfestival – while the Stadthalle Heidelberg remains closed due to renovation – are the Aula of Neue and Alte Universität Heidelberg, which together with the Festivalzentrum, Peterskirche, Jesuitenkirche and the Eugen-Biser-Saal form the festival campus in the heart of the old town. The Heidelberg Congress Center will host the music festival for the first time in 2025. Other venues include the Karlstorbahnhof Heidelberg, the headquarters of the main and founding partner Heidelberg Materials and the headquarters of the Heidelberg property company EPPLE in the city's former Radium brine baths.

The 2025 edition of the quartet festival Heidelberger Frühling Streichquartettfest takes place from 23 to 26 January at the Alte Pädagogische Hochschule Heidelberg and celebrates its 20th birthday. The anniversary edition will focus on the three string quartets by composer Helmut Lachenmann, who will be celebrating his 90th birthday in 2025. They are juxtaposed with works of the genre by Béla Bartók and Ludwig van Beethoven. Guests include the Fabrik Quartet, Quartet HANA, Opus13, Kuss Quartet and Quatuor Diotima, as well as workshop leaders Oliver Wille and Lucas Fels.

 

The all-day competition of the foundation Irene Steels-Wilsing Stiftung, which is held biennially and gives the best young string quartets from all over the world the opportunity to perform in front of an audience, will take place on 22 January. A five-member jury will decide on the awarding of prizes totalling 22,000 euros. In summer 2025, Heidelberger Frühling will not only be hosting its Liedfestival, the programme of which will be published in February 2025. Violinist Lisa Batiashvili and the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Antonio Pappano will also be guests at the Heidelberg Congress Center for a special concert on 3 June.