Wien Modern 39

The 39th edition of the festival Wien Modern will present over 50 productions, including world premieres and first performances, at approximately 25 venues throughout Vienna in the fall of 2026. New works centered on the artistic focus of ecosystems come from Jean-Luc Hervé, Katrin Hornek/Judith Unterpertinger, Katharina Klement, Liza Lim, Annea Lockwood, Barbara Maria Neu, Olga Neuwirth, Pia Palme, Dimitri de Perrot, and others.

This year, Wien Modern will open with the Danube. More specifically: Pia Palme is composing Mit der Donau (in collaboration with artist Lisa Horvath), a full-length work created in part within the Donauauen National Park, which will be premiered on October 30, 2026, by the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra in the renovated Great Hall of the Wiener Konzerthaus. Annea Lockwood invites listeners to explore over 50 locations along the river—from the Black Forest to the Black Sea—with her Sound Map of the Danube. Kirsten Reese, together with biologist and ecoacoustician Sandra Müller, focuses on the sounds of the forest. Katrin Hornek and Judith Unterpertinger, accompanied by a large choir, invite the audience to climb Vienna’s only landfill; Jean-Luc Hervé brings the sounds of insects to a site historically hostile to them—the Zacherl factory, where insecticides were manufactured in the 19th century; Dimitri de Perrot makes the soundscape beneath the ground tangible through a deep borehole. In addition to these and numerous other explorations of a wide variety of ecosystems, the program features Katharina Klement as the recipient of the 2026 Erste Bank Composition Award; two major portrait series on Francesca Verunelli and Elfriede Jelinek as significant co-productions with the Musikverein; celebrations marking the 100th birthdays of Friedrich Cerha and György Kurtág; and Pierre-Laurent Aimard with Mark Andre at the Wiener Konzerthaus.

Wien Modern 39 is made possible by the Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation.

Further information:
wienmodern.at

Dates

October 30 – November 30, 2026
Various venues, Vienna