DREAM

Frederiksberg Festival will be held in 2025 for the 7th time.

The theme "Dream" explores - and perhaps transcends - the boundaries between different art forms
Frederiksberg Festival is an annual cross-aesthetic festival that unites different art forms. The festival will create an event that offers music and performing arts across genres. The aim is that the art forms can mirror each other and also help to open the audience's eyes to other art forms than the ones they are used to seeking out. Each year, the art forms come together under a common theme, and in 2025 the theme is "Dream".

Over the years, the festival has had a special focus on collaborating with other local cultural organisations, presenting both new and more well-known artistic talent.
The festival is held in the 2nd week of September with 14 events at 5 venues in Frederiksberg, the same week as the K7 Culture Week.

The theme 'Dream' and the artistic content of the Festival 2025
Where is the line between dream and reality? It's a question that has always inspired and fascinated. Dreams are the important space where art is born. Reality is the space where art is manifested. Even when the art is created, both artist and audience can have doubts: Was it just a dream?

Music is the anchor of the festival's profile and programme. Music will explore the relationship between dreams and reality. When we are awake, perhaps the closest we get to our dreams is through music and art. Perhaps music is even created from the same material as our dreams.

This year we will perform key masterpieces that have dreams at their centre, including "Dreamscape" by Per Nørgård, "Dream Catcher" by Poul Ruders, as well as a number of new and romantic works, where the dreams and myths, fervour, utopias and nightmares of music are told and interpreted in both dance and text.

Expressionism
We would like to present the expressionism that seems completely dependent on the liberation of dreams and the dissolution of reality, including Arnold Schoenberg, Alban Berg and Scriabin, who let the subconscious and dreams speak in both music and text. Romantic composers such as Sibelius, Schumann and Brahms also have dreams as a theme, and their music is part of the Romantic dream and longing.
We've also invited author Michael Rohde for a conversation about what dreams mean: The broken ones, the nightly dreams, the daydreaming and the utopian dreams we all know. From Sweden comes Stina Ekblad, one of the finest actors in the Nordic region. She reads Edith Södergran's longing, expressive poems.
Also from Sweden is the wonderful Vertavo String Quartet, who have been playing together for more than 25 years.
They will play Per Nørgård's 'Dreamscape' and Ravel's ethereal-lyrical string quartet.

Charismatic Jeanett Albeck sings lullabies, Knud Romer talks about dreams - redeemed and unredeemed, virtuoso Danish soprano Henriette Bonde Hansen sings late romantic reveries, and the equally virtuoso pianist Zlata Chochieva plays music by the mystic Scriabin. We will premiere a work by composer and singer Pernille Sejlund, and ballerina and former solo dancer Kizzy Matiakis will dance to dreamscapes.

Finally, throughout the festival we have a number of ensembles such as Hess is More, Middle East Peace Ensemble, Parsum Project, Lumbye Akademiet, Vokalensemblet Vigdis, and musicians such as Jonas Frølund, Bjarke Mogensen and Katrine Gislinge. Light artist Lars Egegaard Sørensen creates dream images for it all.

We look forward to seeing you at Frederiksberg Festival 2025.

Katrine Gislinge, Artistic Director
Signe Sneh Durholm, Administrative Manager