Classical music still attractive

According to Gerald Mertens, Managing Director of the DOV, over 30,000 people are expected to attend the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra's open-air concert at the Brandenburg Gate on August 24 under its new chief conductor Kirill Petrenko alone.

According to the DOV, 45,000 people attended the Opera for All with the Deutsche Staatsoper and the Staatskapelle Berlin on Bebelplatz in June 2019, 75,000 attended Luitpoldhain in Nuremberg, a further 50,000 attended the Nuremberg Symphony Orchestra in summer 2019 and almost 70,000 people attended Klassik airleben with the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig. 20,000 visitors are expected at today's hr-Sinfonieorchester Open Air in Frankfurt/Main.

However, according to the DOV, these several hundred thousand music lovers have not yet been included in any official attendance statistics, as admission to many large open-air classical music events is free. Even visitors to smaller professional classical music festivals or open-air concerts, concerts at music academies, many chamber music events, concerts in churches or at universities are not recorded statistically, explains Mertens. However, the available open-air attendance figures for this summer definitely show that there is a large potential audience for classical music - even beyond the summer season.