PART Ensemble collaborates with New York-based group Unheard-of//Ensemble for this edition of the Winterfestival REALNESS from January 8th through 10th, 2026. This series of performances and workshops takes place in Düsseldorf and Cologne.
The art’s role in the digital age has taken on even greater cultural importance. Our physical and online spaces seem to be shaped by distorted perceptions and twisted narratives that result in separate information ecosystems. In this fractured environment, art has a role in the telling of personal stories and truths as the author shares their own cultural perspectives.
This symposium on this year’s theme realness will provide members of the public the chance to interact with the two ensembles and invites them to explore the theme of Realness, our perceptions of reality and fact across borders in a digital age. A particular focus will be how music contributes to the evolving and recently more tenuous transatlantic relationship between Germany and the United States. The symposium will also include a range of events from guest composer lectures to student-lead panel discussions and discussions.
The Festival also features guest composer participants from both the Robert Schumann Hochschule and Unheard-of’s CCI Institute in San Antonio 2025.
JAN 8TH
Heinrich Heine University
Realness Symposium
JAN 9TH
St. Albertus Mangus, Düsseldorf
19:00
JAN 10TH
St. Gertrud, Cologne
19:00
This year’s festival will begin on the January 8, 2026, with a symposium at Heinrich Heine University lead by two PART ensemble members Dr. Matthias Geuting (Institute for Musicology) and Dr. Carter Williams (Institute for English and American Studies) with guests from Unheard-of.
On January 9 this festival program continues with concerts at St. Albertus Mangus in Düsseldorf featuring a shared performance with Unheard-of and PART. Unheard-of will perform new works by both U.S. composers and exchange participants from the CCI Institute as well as two works by German composer Reiko Fueting, Chair of composition at Manhattan School of Music. Fueting’s music explores the writing of historian and philosopher Hannah Arendt.
On January 10th at St. Gertrud in Cologne, guest group Unheard-of will present excerpts of Christopher Stark’s Fire Ecologies exploring climate change across the United States in the face of climate denial alongside Vicki Nguyen’s Ginger Flavored Bubblegum. The work honors author Theresa Cha’s life and explores the surge in violence against Asian-American citizens in the aftermath of Covid, with online narratives shaping public conspiracy.
Unheard-of//Ensemble is a contemporary chamber ensemble dedicated to connecting new music to communities in New York and across the United States through the development and performance of adventurous programs using technology and interactive multimedia. Since its founding in 2014, the ensemble has premiered 100 works for the instrumentation including many commissions and has received support from organizations including Chamber Music America, NYSCA, NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, the Brooklyn Arts Council, and Johnstone Fund for New Music.
Unheard-of’s 2024-2025 season continues their commitment to bringing creative new commissions using electronics and multimedia to audiences in New York, as well as creating a cultural dialogue with artists and communities around the country. The ensemble presents two active series to audiences across New York City free of charge, their Dialogues series bringing newly workshopped and developed programs in an approachable setting, and Cultural Ecologies, an immersive set of multimedia concerts in collaboration with the Gowanus Dredgers Canoe Club utilizing floating platforms on Brooklyn’s own Gowanus Canal as its stage.
PART initiates, develops, participates, and cooperates. The 14-member ensemble was founded in 2020 to realize interdisciplinary projects. Its permanent members come from a range of different artistic disciplines. And while the genesis of the group is rooted in its exploration of new music both composed and improvised, a vital source of the ensemble’s creativity is the deep links forged with dance, media art, theatre, film, and literature.
The subjects of the ensemble’s performances also reach out beyond the stage to explore societal and aesthetic themes. PART builds platforms and imaginative performance situations that create a space for artists from all fields.
