Båstad Kammarmusikfestival (Båstad Chamber Music Festival)

Båstad Kammarmusikfestival is back with a vengeance! A very warm welcome to this year’s innovative programme enjoying music from the Twenties during four centuries.

The festival, now in its 29th year, is one of Sweden's largest and most successful classical music festivals. Slightly more bijou in scale for 2021 in accordance with our strict corona-safety protocols, we are sure that this programme offers the much-needed cultural booster shot you have all been longing for.

Our vision has always been to provide a diverse and ambitious programme of high quality musical and cultural performances, in a wide range of venues across this beautiful area of south Sweden. Our new Artistic Director, Cathrine Winnes, herself a conductor of international renown, brings considerable creative energy and innovation to our 2021 programme, developing the scope of the festival, pushing musical and cultural boundaries, and inspiring audiences of the future.

Imagine waking up three hundred years ago! Step back in time to the formal classical concert hall of the 1720’s with Concerto Copenhagen and a meeting of the music of Bach and Couperin. Move on to the 1820´s and enjoy a Schubertiade, Beethoven and Stenhammar.

Or get out your glad rags as we recreate the atmosphere of informal Nineteen Twenties-style clubs and salons, the Chaminade-Club where you might rub shoulders with the legendary Virginia Woolf, and even enjoy a tangojubilee. Meet Eric Satie, the rebel. You may even hear rumours of an illegal Chicago-style ‘Speakeasy’, forbidden for their early jazz and illicit booze.

Join us also to celebrate a number of significant anniversaries: 100 years since women in Sweden got the vote, the 100^thbirthday of Astor Piazzolla, and 100 years since the death of soprano, Christina Nilsson.

Alongside internationally famous classical artists including Paul Lewis, our 2019 programme featured a parallel programme of tango dance workshops and music which proved extremely popular with a delighted new audience. In 2021 we look forward to welcoming, among others, the Stenhammar Quartet, Swedish soprano- superstar Christina Nilsson, Norrbotten NEO, Johan Ullén and the Gunhild Carling Band. And bandoneon player, Per Arne Glorvigen, adds a touch of his Nordic magic to the music of Piazzolla.

Representing the 2020 ´s, young award-winning soloists, very established on the world scene, will perform songs from earlier centuries.

One of our key aims is to provide opportunities for young musicians and composers to perform alongside artists of national and international renown. We are also committed to growing audiences for the future and are proud that entry to most of our concerts is free to under-18’s, as is our children’s concert.

The festival is unique in Sweden to benefit from coverage by Sveriges Radio together with interest from other national media, with two of the concerts to be broadcast nationally.

Most importantly, it is its importance to the local community, which makes the Båstad Kammarmusikfestival an enduring success. Organised, managed and run primarily by a team of over 65 volunteers of all ages and from all sections of the community, this is a significant cultural event for the local community, as well as for Sweden. Without their support the festival just could not take place.