Passionate music-making and an unwavering curiosity for the unknown are the hallmarks of Concerto Köln.
For almost 40 years, the orchestra with its unmistakable sound has been among the leading ensembles in the field of historically informed performance. Firmly rooted in Cologne’s musical life and regularly appearing in the world’s music capitals and at prestigious festivals, Concerto Köln stands for outstanding interpretations of early music.
Concerto Köln manages to interpret even familiar repertoire in a way that is “so fresh and striking it feels like hearing it for the first time” (Die ZEIT).
Their interpretations are developed through a collaborative process based on meticulous source research. Baroque and early Classical works are usually prepared under the direction of one of the concertmasters—Evgeny Sviridov, Mayumi Hirasaki, Justyna Skatulnik, or Anna Dmitrieva. At the heart of their work is always an approach that seeks to recreate the original sound world of the time the works were composed. This passion for historical sound unites the ensemble in its long-standing and fruitful collaborations with Honorary Conductor Kent Nagano and violinist Shunske Sato.
The scholarly-artistic large-scale project The Wagner Cycles, under Kent Nagano, will continue into the 2025/26 season. Together with the Dresden Festival Orchestra, Concerto Köln’s performances of Wagner’s Siegfried in 2025 took the ensemble to Prague, Paris, Cologne, Dresden, and Lucerne. Götterdämmerung will follow in 2026 with performances in Dresden, Bayreuth, Hamburg, and Lucerne.
In addition, the ensemble will bring Handel’s opera Flavio, Re de’ Longobardi to the stage in Cologne and Amsterdam under the direction of Benjamin Bayl, featuring soloists including Julia Lezhneva and Max Emanuel Cencic.
The ensemble will also pay tribute to the great master Bach with performances of the St. John Passion in collaboration with the NDR Vokalensemble conducted by Klaas Stok at the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg and at Kiel Castle, as well as the Mass in B minor with Chorwerk Ruhr under Florian Helgath in Brixen and Schwäbisch Gmünd.
Further highlights of the season include concerts at the International Chopin and His Europe Festival in Warsaw—focusing on Janiewicz and Mozart—at the Leipzig Bach Festival with Max Volbers, Marie Sophie Pollak, and Clara Blessing, and at the Handel Festival in Halle with Valer Sabadus.
In 2025, Concerto Köln celebrates its 40th anniversary. A perfect occasion to launch its own concert series titled We Celebrate, which each year is dedicated to a special anniversary composer. The series began with a tribute to Alessandro Scarlatti, and in 2026 it will continue with the program The Dead Poets Society – dedicated to Queen Christina of Sweden’s Accademia dell’Arcadia.
Since 2008, the ensemble has had a close partnership with the label Berlin Classics but remains active with other labels as well. Its discography now includes more than 75 recordings, many of them award-winning—such as the Grammy Award-winning recording of Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro under René Jacobs.
The work of Concerto Köln is made possible through the generous support of dedicated sponsors, including the Ministry of Culture and Science of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, the NRW Arts Foundation, the Goethe-Institut, and the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media. Since 2009, the ensemble has also enjoyed a close partnership with MBL Unique High End Audio, which enables it to explore questions of sound aesthetics and playback quality in depth.
https://www.concerto-koeln.de/1733.html
Season 2025/2026
For any changes please ask Weigold & Böhm.
