SPONSORED CONTENT - Future music for all senses
The Lucerne Festival's contemporary music festival "Forward" proves that contemporary classical music can inspire a broad audience .
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The Lucerne Festival Forward may only have existed since 2021, but in this short time it has already established itself as a firmly established international forum for contemporary music. The fifth edition of the autumn festival is the last under the artistic direction of Michael Haefliger, who shaped the entire Lucerne Festival for 26 years.
A look at the days from November 21st to 23rd reveals the highlights of the program, which Felix Heri and Mark Sattler have designed together with a group from the Lucerne Festival Academy network: The Lucerne Festival Contemporary Orchestra (LFCO) will perform with both the star violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja and the cello shooting star Anastasia Kobekina; the performer Charlotte Hug, who has just been awarded the Swiss Music Prize, and the sensational young alto saxophonist Tapiwa Svosve will develop concept improvisations with soloists from the LFCO.
Finally, the participatory sound installation "Draussen Drinnen" (Outside Inside) by Daniel Ott and Enrico Stolzenburg, with over 300 participants, transforms not only the KKL Luzern (Lucerne Culture and Congress Centre) but also its surroundings into a vibrant soundscape. This Gesamtkunstwerk (total work of art) emerges from the interaction of LFCO members with students from the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts, music students, Superar Suisse, carnival bands, whip crackers, tap dancers, and many others. The aim is to dissolve the boundaries between inside and outside, concert hall and city, high culture and everyday culture, and to take all participants on a journey that ultimately brings them together in a powerful, collective soundscape within the KKL.
Anastasia Kobekina: I've admired Patricia for many years and always follow her work closely. We first met in person in 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic, in the "Momentum" project by the Canadian conductor Barbara Hannigan. She focuses intensively on the music of the 20th and 21st centuries. At that time, we performed together with Patricia in Vienna. Since then, we have performed together several times, playing, among many other works, Franz Schubert's "Trout Quintet," as well as some of her own compositions.
Can you tell us anything about Patricia Kopatchinskaja's "Five Dreams," which you will be performing with her on November 22nd?It's a double concerto for violin, cello, and chamber orchestra that we're performing in this new version. It's music that must be experienced live and felt with all the senses, because it's so full of color and movement. We perform from different locations on the stage. There are scenic elements, almost like a theatrical performance. The instruments sing, speak, and whisper.
Contemporary classical music is considered very abstract and inaccessible by many people. What about here?There's no need to be afraid of her, and apart from curiosity, no special qualifications are required. The dynamism that characterizes Patricia as an artist is very evident here. Of course, there's a canon in classical music, which Patricia and I approach with respect and a commitment to fidelity to the work. But not everything stands still forever, and we are artists who like to think ahead.
What is special about Patricia Kopatchinskaja for you?Her authenticity. She doesn't just play her music, she lives it on stage in every note. That inspires me too. I feel a deep spiritual connection to her. And I'm fascinated by how she develops a completely new sonic language in her compositions.
Is «Five Dreams» a technically difficult piece?It demands openness to different forms of expression from both soloists. There are lyrical passages in which the cello truly sings, but also moments in which it sounds as you've never heard it before, and this will be particularly evident in the KKL with its unique acoustics. I don't want to reveal any more just yet!
Are you already familiar with the hall?Oh yes, and I love it! On New Year's Day 2025, I played Tchaikovsky's "Variations on a Rococo Theme" there with the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra under Daniele Rustioni. And I'm already looking forward to performing Elgar's Cello Concerto there on June 10, 2026, with the Lucerne Festival Strings under Daniel Dodds. Above all, though, I think the KKL is also exceptionally well-suited for contemporary music.
The Lucerne Festival Forward aims to give a voice to a young generation of musicians – and thus attract a broad audience to the diversity of contemporary music. With wit and humor, it counters the prejudice that contemporary music is elitist, inaccessible, or even unpalatable. In its four editions to date, it has brilliantly succeeded in this endeavor. The curators can draw upon the Lucerne Festival Academy's extensive international network, which has grown over the years and now comprises more than 1,500 artists, as a mastermind. With surprising concert formats, they bring contemporary music out of its niche and transform it into a sensual experience that engages the whole person.
When Charlotte Hug performs her late-night act entitled "Multiple Encounters in Constant Change," for example, physical movement, sound, and visual art merge. The performer and composer uses brush and water to create ephemeral "son-icons" on large sheets of fabric, giving the audience the experience of a magical, transient present.
From Gore-Tex to global starsThe festival's opening on Friday evening already sets the stage for the unexpected: In the box in front of the Lucerne Theatre, five very different performances by members of the LFCO will take place. Among other things, the world premiere of the commissioned work "other spaces" by Neo Hülcker will be performed, and in Carola Bauckholt's work "Hirn & Ei" (Brain & Egg), four percussionists will demonstrate the diverse rhythms and sounds they can coax from their Gore-Tex rain jackets by wiping and rubbing them.
Violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja is a world-renowned star and no stranger to the Lucerne Festival: she will be performing for the third time at the Forward Festival on Saturday evening with musicians from the LFCO. This time, she will appear as both composer and soloist: together with Anastasia Kobekina (see interview below), she will present her concerto "Five Dreams" for violin, cello, and chamber orchestra, based on her 2024 composition "A Play." The first part of the evening will feature the piano concerto "Introitus" by the composer Sofia Gubaidulina, who passed away in March 2025, and the world premiere of Shawn Jaeger's commissioned work "Mountains are Fountains."
Around this festival highlight are grouped formats such as the family-friendly sound expedition "Water Music," in which members of the LFCO and Lucerne school classes accompany the audience in three groups from the shores of Lake Lucerne to the KKL. A distinguished panel will discuss the future prospects of contemporary classical music, and a book presentation will introduce a new work to mark the 125th anniversary of the Swiss Association of Composers.
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