The two-day festival ‘Bauhaus Music. I Feel Air from Another Planet’, organised by the Bauhaus-Archiv / Museum für Gestaltung, will take place on 13 and 14 November at St. Elisabeth. Under the theme ‘Sound as Colour, Colour as Sound’, it explores the concept of synaesthesia and invites visitors to experience sound, colour, space, the body and movement in a new light.

Heinrich Siegfried Bormann, „analyse eines tonstücks.“, 1930 Bauhaus-Archiv Berlin

The concert programme, focusing on modernist music, ranges from avant-garde and classical to experimental and jazz.

On 14 November, it will be accompanied by workshops on the Bauhaus theory of harmonisation at the Temporary Bauhaus Archive in Berlin-Charlottenburg.

The evening concert on Friday 13 November explores various paths to the Gesamtkunstwerk – a theme that was also significant at the Bauhaus. Dorothea Röschmann (soprano) and the Deutsches Kammerorchester Berlin, conducted by Karl-Heinz Steffens, will perform works by Lyonel Feininger, Richard Wagner, Arnold Schoenberg and Stefan Wolpe.

Schönberg’s musical setting of the confession “I feel air from another planet” serves as the guiding principle for music that leaves familiar structures behind and opens up new realms of listening and perception. The evening concert brings together various representatives of artistic thinking that pushes boundaries.

Saturday 14 November begins with two workshops: ‘Kandinsky Synths’ from 11.00 am to 12.30 pm and from 12.30 pm to 2.00 pm. Drawing on Wassily Kandinsky’s theory of colour and form, homemade mini-synthesisers make colours audible and allow participants to experience synaesthetic perceptions. From 2.30 pm to 4 pm, the workshop ‘Left Hand Yellow!’ invites participants to explore Gertrud Grunow’s theory of harmonisation through movement, colours and their own bodies. All workshops are free of charge and take place at the Temporary Bauhaus Archive in Berlin-Charlottenburg.

The three guided concerts on Saturday, 14 November, are entirely dedicated to the festival’s theme ‘Sound as Colour, Colour as Sound’.

At St Elisabeth’s, the programme from 5 pm features piano works by Scriabin, Liszt, Ligeti, Messiaen and Takemitsu.

This will be followed at 6.30 pm by Messiaen’s ‘Quatuor pour la fin du temps’. The piece combines birdcalls with unusual rhythms, thereby challenging our usual sense of time.

To round off the evening, from 8.00 pm, ‘The Bauhaus-Kapelle Bauhaus Music’ will perform music by Duke Ellington. This concert brings together jazz, Bauhaus history and a diverse range of musical timbres.

Since 2021, the Bauhaus Archive / Museum für Gestaltung has been exploring the connection between the Bauhaus and music as part of an interdisciplinary research project. In 2023, the findings of the research project were presented for the first time as part of the Bauhaus Music festival. In 2024, the festival’s theme was ‘Freedom’. In 2025, Bauhaus Music was a guest at the Musikfest Berlin, featuring, amongst other things, the world premiere of Marc Blitzstein’s opera ‘Parabola and Circula’.

Bauhaus Music 2026. I Feel Air from Another Planet

Artistic Directors: Michal Friedländer, Dr Kai H. Müller, Karl-Heinz Steffens

Venues:

St. Elisabeth, Invalidenstraße 3, 10115 Berlin

The Temporary Bauhaus-Archiv, Knesebeckstraße 1, 10623 Berlin

Evening concert: Bauhaus Music 2026

Friday, 13 November 26, 7.00 pm (introduction at 6.00 pm)

St. Elisabeth, Invalidenstraße 3, 10115 Berlin

Lyonel Feininger: Fugue in D flat minor
Richard Wagner: Siegfried Idyll WWV103
Stefan Wolpe: Concerto for Nine Instruments, Op. 22
Interval
Arnold Schoenberg: String Quartet No. 2, Op. 10, with soprano

German Chamber Orchestra Berlin

Conductor: Karl-Heinz Steffens

Dorothea Röschmann (soprano)

Mayumi Kanagawa (violin)

Tomoki Park (piano)

Irena Josifoska (cello)

Roy Amotz (flute)

Stefan de Leval Jezierski (horn)

Roman Reznik (bassoon)

and others

Sound as colour, colour as sound – three moderated concerts

Saturday, 14 November 26, 5.00–9.30 pm

St. Elisabeth, Invalidenstraße 3, 10115 Berlin

5–6 pm: Aleksandr Scriabin, György Ligeti, Tōru Takemitsu and others: piano works

Yu Kosuge (piano)

6.30–7.30 pm: Olivier Messiaen: Quatuor pour la fin du temps

Guy Braunstein (violin)

Michal Friedländer (piano)

Karl-Heinz Steffens (clarinet)

Irena Josifoska (cello)

8.00–9.30 pm: Duke Ellington meets the Bauhaus-Kapelle, The Bauhaus Music Big Band led by Karl-Heinz Steffens

Presented by: Kai Hinrich Müller

Additional information

Bauhaus & Modernism

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