ACHT BRÜCKEN | Music for Cologne 2022 – Music Amnesia Memory

Five international guests, including journalists and festival directors from India, Croatia, Portugal, Spain and the Czech Republic, followed the invitation of the International Visitors Programme and visited North Rhine-Westphalia from 29 April to 3 May for the ACHT BRÜCKEN festival in Cologne. The programme included attending numerous festival concerts, among others at the Kölner Philharmonie and the WDR Funkhaus, as well as accompanying events and concerts as part of "ACHT BRÜCKEN Freihafen" on 1 May.

The guests also had the opportunity for an intensive exchange and to get to know the artistic management team of ACHT BRÜCKEN 2022: Louwrens Langevoort, Director of the Kölner Philharmonie and Managing Director of ACHTBRÜCKEN GmbH, Andrea Zschunke, Head of the Music and Radio Art Programme Group at WDR 3, Daniel Mennicken, Managing Director of ON - Neue Musik Koeln e.V., Dr Hermann-Christoph Müller, Department of Music, Cultural Office Cologne and Dr Nicolette Schäfer, Dramaturgy, and Nina Buttmann, Communication, ACHT BRÜCKEN.

The guests were able to make further contacts with players from NRW in the field of experimental and improvised music at a network meeting entitled "A Soundtrip through NRW": The meeting included a visit to the venue for the "POP-UP AUDIO ARCHITECTURE" project (RE-LOAD FUTURA / LTK4, Cologne) followed by a discussion with Rochus Aust, artist and curator, LTK4 (Cologne), Evelin Degen, E-MEX-Ensemble (Essen) and Dr Christian Esch, Director of the NRW KULTURsekretariat (project: Soundtrips NRW). The guests also had the opportunity to take an exclusive tour of the WDR studio for electronic music during a joint meeting with Matthias Kremin, Head of Programming WDR3 / WDR5.