HfMT Big Band: THE SHAPE WE MAKE

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On November 9, 2026, the Cologne University of Music and Dance Big Band, under the direction of Theresia Philipp, will present a program at the Stadtgarten featuring works by contemporary female composers who view the big band as a compositional medium of the 21st century.

The program will feature compositions by Maria Schneider, Miho Hazama, Cassie Kinoshi, and other national and international voices from the current large-ensemble scene. Their music combines orchestral thinking with improvisation, works with timbres, textures, and unusual forms, and expands the possibilities of the jazz orchestra beyond traditional big band concepts.

The program is part of the La Cité des Dames series. The program selection was co-curated with input from the Diversity Working Group of Department 6. The selected works offer diverse perspectives on writing for large ensembles—ranging from finely crafted soundscapes to complex rhythmic structures and open improvisational concepts.

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Venue:

Stadtgarten

The first concert in the newly built Stadtgarten concert hall in the mid-1980s launched a program unlike anything Germany had seen: an independent, artistically driven concert series devoted to contemporary improvised music. It was guided neither by attendance figures nor by public subsidies, yet it guaranteed musicians minimum fees and was run on professional terms. The conditions mattered just as much: an acoustically optimized, street-level concert space offering a strong setting for audiences and performers alike. Operations were financed through the adjoining hospitality business, the Stadtgarten restaurant and beer garden, a model that drew attention well beyond Germany.

Today the Stadtgarten Köln ranks among Europe's internationally recognized venues for contemporary and improvised music. The American magazine Down Beat features it regularly in its listings; it has received Germany's federal APPLAUS venue program award several times, including "Venue of the Year" in 2016, followed by the German Jazz Prize in the same category in 2022. More than 400 events across the full spectrum of contemporary music now take place there each year. Its international standing rests above all on the high proportion of demanding, experimental programming.

A programming mission of this kind depends on reliable public support. The venue's 30th anniversary in September 2016 opened that prospect: through a partnership between the City of Cologne and the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, programming work is being substantially strengthened, and from 2017 onward the Stadtgarten Köln is being developed step by step into a "European Center for Jazz and Contemporary Music" – with the goal of becoming one of Europe's leading music centers.

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