BL!NDMAN [hybrid] x Zwerm

Where Is Home? 

Coming home in music

A man steps onto the stage, cello in hand. He looks out into the concert hall, spreads his arms and says, ‘Welcome. Tonight, you are not listeners, but participants. Our meeting is an exchange.’ Then he begins to sing and play, and everything becomes clear. He absorbs the audience’s energy like a human antenna and returns it tenfold. The concert hall shifts into an intimate living room. Everyone who witnessed it walks away transformed. 

This is essentially how a concert by Abel Selaocoe unfolds. Together with this charismatic cellist, singer and composer, we warmly welcome you to the 21st Klarafestival. As a festival artist, Selaocoe will play three concerts spanning the full spectrum of his musical world. From traditional music from his native South Africa to baroque, jazz, contemporary classical and improvisation: he melds all these influences into a unique body of work, centred on identity and cultural exchange.

The theme of this year's festival is taken from the debut album of Selaocoe’s own Bantu Ensemble: Where Is Home? It is an open question with endless answers – especially in the super-diverse city of Brussels, home to 180 nationalities and 100 languages. Our capital is a crossroads, a refuge, a temporary or permanent home for countless individuals, each carrying their own story. Every day, we feel privileged that our festival can take root in such fertile soil.

Klarafestival 2026 is an ode to the city we call home. During Muziekberg/Mont des Musiques, Brussels musicians will take over the Kunstberg (Mont des Arts) for a day, from the Musical Instruments Museum to Bozar, from the Ravenstein Gallery to the Royal Museums of Fine Arts. And both Radio Lomax and the choir Les Invisibles (La Voix des Femmes Sans Papiers) will perform Brussels songs with diverse roots. 

Our mission is to show as wide an audience as possible that classical music is alive and kicking. Even the most familiar works take on fresh life in the hands of the adventurous musicians we surround ourselves with. Prepare to be captivated by Bach's St John Passion as conducted by Maxim Emelyanychev. Marvel at Beethoven and Strauss with the Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg. Rediscover Chopin and Scriabin in a performance by Alexandre Kantorow. Or encounter keyboard phenomenon Anthony Romaniuk: like Abel Selaocoe, he intertwines his own compositions with the established repertoire, from Bach to Björk.  

This festival programme features many more musical kindred spirits. Annelies Van Parys completed the 8th symphony of her former teacher Luc Brewaeys. Pianists Kris Defoort and Stephane Ginsburgh pay tribute to their friend Philippe Boesmans, who would have turned 90 in 2026. Abel Selaocoe, in turn, improvises with like-minded souls, both old and new, and performs a brand-new cello concerto by American composer Jessie Montgomery. 

None of this would be possible without the support of our partners in Brussels and beyond. Bozar, Flagey, De Munt, Ancienne Belgique, Brussels Philharmonic, Belgian National Orchestra, Passa Porta, BNA-BBOT and the Luc Brewaeys Foundation all contribute to Klarafestival’s unique DNA. Our indispensable private partners include KPMG Belgium, Proximus, Brugse Zot, Gimv/WorxInvest and Interparking. We are grateful for the support of the Flemish Community, the Flemish Community Commission, the Brussels-Capital Region and the National Lottery. Our collaboration with VRT and Klara, meanwhile, is the secret to our success as a broadcasting festival. Above all, we thank our enthusiastic audience who follow us both in the concert hall and at home on the radio and VRT MAX. 

For Abel Selaocoe, ‘home’ is much more than a building or a place. 'It can be a spiritual space. It can be people. (...) It can be something you find along your travels.’ For seven years, Klarafestival has been ‘home’ for festival director Joost Fonteyne. His sense of adventure and social connection is more evident than ever in this festival programme. In April 2026, he will continue his journey and pass the torch to Jan Van den Borre. Many thanks, Joost, for the wonderful years!

The Klarafestival Team

Joost Fonteyne, intendant

Jan Raes, chairman

Chantal Pattyn, network manager Klara

My Heart Cannot Die. The Soul of Gesualdo

A room filled with voices and texts that transcend the centuries. Fragments of poetry and harmony intertwine. A guitar note, a trenchant phrase, a breath, a subtle dissonance. In this concert programme, the music hovers between madrigal and modulation, between the memory of a high-born composer and the echoes of forgotten female voices.

In the historical imagination surrounding Italian madrigal culture, one name quickly springs to mind: Carlo Gesualdo (1566–1613), the enfant terrible of the Renaissance, as famous for his adventurous madrigals as he is notorious for the murder of his wife and her lover.

Traditionally, his work has been interpreted as the expression of a tormented genius. In My Heart Cannot Die, BL!NDMAN [hybrid] and Zwerm unpick this romanticised myth and offer a polyphonic, contemporary response to the madrigal culture of the late Renaissance. They sketch a new portrait of Gesualdo as a talented aristocrat, a spider in the patriarchal web of power, violence and privilege. They juxtapose his music and texts with those of female contemporaries who, each in their own way, contributed to a refined and innovative madrigal tradition.

Maddalena Casulana (1544–1590), for example, was not only a remarkable singer, lutenist and composer with a sophisticated sense of counterpoint and chromaticism, but also wrote incisive texts about men, women and music. Her madrigal Morir non può il mio cuore provides an intriguing counterpoint in this project, both lyrically and musically. The nun and multi-instrumentalist Vittoria Aleotti (1575–1620) was also a gifted lutenist who celebrated life and love in groundbreaking madrigals and was the first to set the famous poem T’amo, mia vita to music – even before Gesualdo and Monteverdi.

With this project, BL!NDMAN [hybrid] and Zwerm set out not to re-enact the past, but to offer a contemporary exploration of how we listen to Renaissance composers. They begin with a sixteenth-century understanding of the madrigal as occasional music: modular in both musical and textual structure, flexible in instrumentation and adaptable to the needs of the moment. In this spirit of openness, BL!NDMAN and Zwerm treat the repertoire of Carlo Gesualdo, Maddalena Casulana and Vittoria Aleotti as pliable sound and text material. New instrumental arrangements bring the echoes of these Italian madrigalists into the present day. Expansive soundscapes mix with contemporary reflections through free reworkings of sonic fragments, musical noise, and projected texts that cast a critical light on the music and its legacy.

How did we – and do we – view women in music? And how should we approach the work of a composer who, in addition to exquisite madrigals, also has a murder to his name? A thought-provoking musical reflection on the past and the present.

Tomas Serrien, BL!NDMAN 

Translation: Catherine Grady

BL!NDMAN [hybrid] 

For more than 35 years, the contemporary collective BL!NDMAN has been synonymous with originality and experimentation. Founded in 1988 by Eric Sleichim as a unique saxophone quartet, the ensemble has significantly enriched the repertoire for the instrument. BL!NDMAN profiles itself as a musical research laboratory that is open to dialogue between different musical styles and artistic disciplines, leading to collaborations with artists such as Ivo van Hove, Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker and Heiner Goebbels. Since 2006, the original BL!NDMAN [sax] has expanded to include a percussion quartet, a string quartet and BL!NDMAN [hybrid], a variable and project-based ensemble active since 2014.

ZWERM

The electric guitar quartet ZWERM has a versatile artistic profile, with a repertoire ranging from Renaissance music to contemporary creations and experimental pop and rock. Guided not by a fixed style but by musical curiosity, the ensemble has collaborated with musicians and composers such as Fred Frith, Mauro Pawlowski and Stefan Prins, as well as with creators such as visual artist Benjamin Verdonck, choreographer Claire Croizé and theatre company Bad Van Marie. ZWERM has performed at venues including Ultima Festival Oslo, the Ruhrtriennale, TivoliVredenburg Utrecht and The Barbican Centre London.