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Two symphonies that are nicknamed "great" - Mozart's 40th in G minor and Schubert's eighth in C major - plus a large orchestral work by the composer who has been nicknamed the "female Beethoven". All that's missing is a large orchestra. But that's not the case here. Instead, four great musicians play arrangements of great music. So we'll hear: Schubert in what Schumann calls the "heavenly length" of just under an hour, "like a thick novel in four volumes by Jean Paul, for example, which can never end." Plus Mozart's penultimate symphony, a piece of which there are probably as many different interpretations as there are exegetes. And finally: Faust! When we talk about seduction, Goethe's hero as a central figure in literary history cannot be left out, and so we also hear an arrangement of the Faust Overture , which Emilie Mayer wrote in 1879 and which was one of the few works by the highly talented composer to be published during her lifetime.

On selected days, the festival is “With the star at the bar” in the Schwetzinger Kurfürstenstube and talks to him about music. Reservations can be made by phone: 06202 / 933020

In the family concert, SPARK brings together three completely different B's: Johann Sebastian Bach as the forefather of classical art music, Luciano Berio as one of the most influential composers of the 20th century and the Beatles as titans of pop music. On the journey through these three different sound worlds there is something new to discover - such as the crazy playing techniques that Luciano Berio came up with for the instruments. And familiar and well-known things can be experienced in a new way with SPARK when they whirl across the stage in their version of Bach's famous Badinerie or add their own motifs and melodies to a prelude by Bach's contemporary Christoph Graupner. The five musicians move between eras and genres with great virtuosity and a lot of joy in playing. In doing so, they constantly open up new sounds and scenery for themselves and their audience, expand, explain, contrast and create a lively dialogue between baroque and modern. SPARK unashamedly and naturally draws on all genres, breaks unnecessary boundaries and celebrates one thing above all with passionate devotion: good music, namely Bach – Berio – Beatles .

Young authors from the music journalism course at the Karlsruhe University of Music let themselves be seduced by the special atmosphere of Schwetzingen Palace and the park and use their impressions to create inspiring audio pieces about the festival - sometimes humorous, sometimes informative, full of music and the musical history of this special place.

Small cause - big effect: In paradise, an apple was enough to plunge humanity into misfortune until Judgement Day. In 1972, the East German writer Peter Hacks surprised his audiences in both East and West Germany when he turned the biblical story of the fall of the first human couple into a comedy. It was his eye for the absurdities of existence, trained in everyday life in the GDR, that enabled him to reveal the humor in the story of the fall in linguistic virtuosity. At the same time, with his comedy Adam and Eve, he created a sharp-tongued plea for a concept of freedom that eludes all moral categories. Did Adam and Eve act rightly or wrongly? It doesn't matter - they acted. Mike Svoboda, composer and trombonist, American in Switzerland and a musical crossover between new music, jazz, performance and subtle humor, has so far concentrated as an opera composer on works for young and very young audiences. So trained in the combination of sophistication and lightness, Svoboda is predestined to set Hacks' paradisiacal comedy to music and demonstrate its topicality. Anne-May Krüger wrote the libretto for his music theater Adam and Eve. The composer himself conducts the hr Symphony Orchestra.

When SPARK invites you to a concert, there is a lot to see and hear. First of all, there are lots of instruments: piano, violin, viola, cello, melodica, plus around 20 recorders in different sizes and types of wood. There are also pieces from different eras, from the Baroque to the present day. Even sounds that are several centuries old still get your feet moving today. But the musicians also play a catchy Hungarian folk tune or a pop song by ABBA, one of their absolute favorite bands. And they demonstrate new playing techniques of modern avant-garde music on their instruments, without you having to develop any new music escape reflexes. Important questions are also answered: for example, how exactly a note is created on a string instrument or how to play a "flutter tongue" on the recorder. And of course the musicians also talk about their everyday working life on stages around the world - from London, Amsterdam and Berlin to Shanghai.

You wish - we play! In the past, this was often seen on television and radio, but today what you wish for is played live. The only condition: it has to be one of the 600 or so songs by Schubert, because on this evening, tenor Julian Prégardien, together with Anna Gebhardt on the piano, will delve deep into Schubert's unique cosmos of poem settings. On every ticket purchased for this concert there is an email address to which you can send your desired song - preferably with a short explanation of why you want it to be this particular song. Was it perhaps a support for the first kiss, was it sung in the family, was it a catalyst for joy, an instrument of hope, nourishment for the soul in times of suffering? Prégardien, who will not only sing but also host this evening, will make a selection from the most frequently mentioned songs and add his own favorites to these.

Typical characteristics of popular music are the ability to sing along, dance and be recognisable. In this sense, the English composer John Dowland was already writing pop songs in the 16th century: Come again, sweet Love for example, Flow my Tears or Come, heavy Sleep – the beauty and emotionality of these songs still overwhelm us today. So what could be better than dreaming your way into the night with Ayres and instrumental music by John Dowland and his contemporaries Thomas Morley, Orlando Gibbons and John Bull? The three musicians of the Vienna Vivid Consort are both singers and recorder players, alternating between singing and instruments, and for this programme with Ayres from the height of the English Renaissance they have teamed up with the lutenist David Bergmüller. The spectrum ranges from quiet, intimate solo works to songs and complex, full-voiced consort movements. And in keeping with the English word “vivid” in the trio’s title, the evening becomes a lively journey into the richness of sound and expression of the Elizabethan era.

A dancer moves his body, his muscles. Why do we find that beautiful? How do grace, elegance and sensuality arise in movement, and how consciously and emotionally does a dancer have to dance so that his performance can be touching? In 1810, Heinrich von Kleist wrote a famous essay on marionette theatre, and the star soloist of the Stuttgart Ballet, together with the artist and choreographer Thomas Lempertz, used this text as the basis for the solo performance The Soul on a String . Kleist puts forward the thesis that true grace is only possible with a puppet, because there is no mind controlling the movements. Friedemann Vogel counters this with movements with consciousness and inner emotion, but is accompanied and questioned by a dancer avatar. With The Soul on a String, a unique work of art made up of dance, music and video is coming to Schwetzingen, which has only been seen in two places so far. The audience there was deeply moved.

Eight singers, a conductor, choral settings for the great biblical hymn about love, the Song of Songs, plus songs about flowers: the a cappella program of the British Marian Consort offers stimulation for all the senses and pure seduction. In addition, you experience music history in fast forward, starting with music of the late Renaissance, lingering longer with Benjamin Britten's Five Flower Songs , which are composed in the style of Edward Elgar, Charles Parry and Charles Villiers Stanford, and ending with two commissioned works. One of them, composed by the British Laura Cannell, dares to combine folk, old and experimental new music. This suits an ensemble that has earned itself the reputation of a vocal pioneering group in program compilation and presentation. Rory McCleery conducts the program, the intense sound of which should unfold optimally in the wide space of the Trinity Church in Speyer.