It was founded in 1991 by the German musicians and composers Adrian Adlam and Utz Köster. Since 2021, they have been working in collaboration with Deutschlandfunk Kultur and NDR Kultur, with more than 40 concerts taking place each year that are recorded and broadcast live on radio. The festival's programme is devoted to one or more specific themes and always look to be an innovative take on the classical repertoire. The Internationale Fredener Musiktage festival is an international showcase for composers and, at the same time, it plays an important educational role for the city and region's inhabitants, bringing them closer to classical and contemporary chamber music. An exhibition and other cultural activities also form part of the festival. This year's programme includes “Duo Seraphim”, a piece composed by the Catalan composer Bernat Vivancos especially for the occasion and performed by the Catalan soprano Núria Rial and Miriam Feuersinger from Austria.

“Duo Seraphim“ is 80 minutes long, intended to be performed in one part, uninterrupted. Bernat Vivancos' new compositions (with two sopranos, two cornettos, a viola da gamba quartet and an organ) will be interspersed with older music (only solos or duets and an organ) from different authors.

Over the course of the festival, chamber music from various eras will be shown in several different emblematic locations in and around the city. This year, after the festival had to be cancelled in 2020 due to the Coronavirus pandemic, the 30th edition will take place from 23rd July until 5th August under the title of “Plan B: Beethoven, Bach, Brahms…”. The festival has been organised in accordance with all the health measures of the local authorities.

Bernat Vivancos

The musician Bernat Vivancos (Barcelona, 1973) is heavily influenced by his years of experience in the choir at the Abbey of Montserrat.

He was the musical director of the Choir of Montserrat, a role he carried out alongside his teaching activity, ever since 2003, as a professor of Composition and Orchestration at the Escola Superior de Música de Catalunya-ESMUC.

In 2011, he released a selection of choral music on a double album, “Blanc” (Neu Records), recorded by the Latvian Radio Choir directed by Sigvards Klava, and a winner of two Catalan awards for the best album of 2011, and in 2016 he released, with the same choir and record label, another double CD, “Requiem”, also unanimously praised by critics.

Vivancos has a wide repertoire of vocal and instrumental music at his disposal, particularly orchestral productions, for which he has worked with several groups from around the world.

Núria Rial

Núria Rial studies singing and piano and in 2003 was awarded the “Preis der Helvetia Patria Jeunesse Stiftung” by Pro Europa. She has performed at the main music festivals in Europe and has worked with directors such as Ivan Fischer, Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Paul Goodwin, Trevor Pinnock, Howard Griffiths, Gustav Leonhardt, René Jacobs, Thomas Hengelbrock, Laurence Cummings, Neville

Marriner and Teodor Currenztzis. She was also worked with groups such as Concerto Köln, The English Concert, Kammerorchester Basel, Collegium 1704, Il Giardino Armonico, Les Musiciens du Louvre, Elbipolis Barockorchester, Le Cetra Basel and L'Arpeggiata.

Likewise, she has taken part in important operatic productions at, among others, Théâtre de la Monnaie in Brussels, Staatsoper Berlin and the Grand Théâtre de Genève. Rial has also released a number of albums.