Zwischentöne Chamber Music Festival 2026

The Zwischentöne Chamber Music Festival, founded in 2015, has grown steadily to become one of the most distinctive chamber music festivals in Switzerland. What began as a weekend of 6 concerts in the intimate Baroque Hall of the Engelberg Monastery has developed into a 10-concert event that attracts world-class musicians and an enthusiastic international audience. Previous artists have included Sir András Schiff, Julian Pregardien, Ian Bostridge, Dénes Várjon, Juliane Banse and Alfred Brendel. A key characteristic of the festival is a thematically curated program emphasizing an interaction between past and present, familiar and lesser-known. This is reflected in the name: Zwischentöne, which in English means ‚nuances', but includes a wordplay of 'between the notes‘. Next to the beloved masterpieces of Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann and Brahms, past editions have highlighted the music of Rebecca Clarke, Kaija Saariaho, and Sandor Veress, and included premieres of new compositions by David Philip Hefti, Roland Moser and Helena Winkelman.The festival also places a strong emphasis on collaborations between established artists and newcomers. This year’s artists will include Alexander Lonquich, piano, Yura Lee, violin and viola, Dmytro Udyvchenko, winner of the 2024 Queen Elizabeth Competition and the Merel Quartet as ensemble-in-residence.The Zwischentöne Festival takes place in mid-October in Engelberg, surrounded by the high alps of inner Switzerland south of Lucerne.