20 Years of Gratitude to Jerusalem

AUGUST 2 – 6, 2026
Jerusalem · Tel Aviv · Ramallah

Twenty years ago, Sounding Jerusalem began with a simple vision: to create a festival for everyone in a city where humanity reveals itself in all its beauty — but also in its contradictions, fragility, and tensions. A city shaped by light and shadow, where history, spirituality, and everyday life exist side by side. A place where music can speak when words are not enough.

Over two decades, Jerusalem has shaped this festival as much as the festival has reflected the city. It has taught us resilience, attentiveness, and the ability to remain present in complexity — to listen beyond certainty and to stay open in moments of contrast and uncertainty.

For twenty years, the festival has brought music into many different spaces: rooftops above the Old City, courtyards, sacred buildings, and public places where art meets daily life. Its artistic world has always been a kaleidoscope of genres and traditions, bringing together internationally renowned musicians and diverse musical voices from around the world.

The 2026 anniversary edition, With Gratitude to Jerusalem, is a distillation of this journey. An intimate programme for two voices stands at its centre — reduced to the essential, where every sound carries weight and every silence becomes meaningful.

Alongside this, Sounding Jerusalem continues its collaboration with the students of the Magnificat Institute of Music in the Old City, supporting young musicians and investing in the city’s musical future. The festival also brings music into homes and families — the spaces where human coexistence begins. At the same time, it reaches beyond Jerusalem, creating connections between East and West — from Tel Aviv and Ramallah to Vatican City, where the twentieth anniversary will continue with a concert at the Campo Santo Teutonico.

In doing so, “Sounding Jerusalem” remains faithful to one of its founding convictions: that music can cross borders, create encounters where they seem impossible, and remind us never to stop reaching out to one another – in whatever form that conversation may take.

This anniversary edition is our gift to Jerusalem — with gratitude, humility, and hope.

Erich Oskar Huetter

PROGRAM | Tickets

We are delighted to welcome you to Sounding Jerusalem 2026.

Prices

70 NIS / person / concert

4 August – Church of the Redeemer, Jerusalem

6 August – Zimbalista Gallery, Tel Aviv

Admission to all other concerts is free. Donations are warmly welcome.

Order tickets:
Advance online reservation is required. Please use the reservation button next to each concert to reserve your seat. You will receive an automatic confirmation email.

Please bring your reservation confirmation and the admission fee to the concert.

Payment is cash only at the box office on the day of the concert. Reserved tickets are held until 30 minutes before the concert begins. After that time, seats may be released to other guests.

The box office opens one hour before the concert.

Seating: Free seating (first come, first served). If you are unable to attend, we kindly ask you to cancel your reservation so your seat can be offered to another guest.

AUGUST 2, 7 PM

TWENTY YEARS OF SOUNDING JERUSALEM

Ibn Samhan Castle, Ras Karkar, Ramallah

TWENTY YEARS OF SOUNDING JERUSALEM

Guest Concert at Ibn Samhan Castle

Erich Oskar Huetter – cello (Austria)
Armin Egger – guitar (Austria)

The Ibn Samhan Castle has been part of the Sounding Jerusalem journey for several years, and every return has been marked by a particularly warm welcome, openness, and meaningful encounters with the people of the village.

These repeated experiences of hospitality and exchange make it a deeply significant place within the festival’s history — a space where genuine artistic and human connections have already taken root.

It is therefore a natural and meaningful setting to continue celebrating 20 years of Sounding Jerusalem, together with a community that has contributed so much to this ongoing dialogue through music.

TICKETS

AUGUST 4, 8 PM

A DISTILLATION OF TWENTY YEARS

Church of the Redeemer, Old City, Jerusalem

With Gratitude to Jerusalem

Erich Oskar Huetter – cello (Austria)
Armin Egger – guitar (Austria)

Twenty years of Sounding Jerusalem are distilled into a programme for cello and guitar. In its most intimate form, the music becomes transparent, essential, and deeply human — a concert of gratitude to Jerusalem and to the encounters that have shaped these twenty years.

For two decades, the Church of the Redeemer has been the festival’s central partner and its musical home in Jerusalem. This anniversary concert is also a heartfelt expression of gratitude for twenty years of trust, friendship, and shared music-making.

Programme:
A musical journey for cello and guitar spanning the Baroque, Romantic, and modern repertoire. The programme brings together works by European masters including Johann Sebastian Bach, Francisco Tárrega, Edward Elgar, Enrique Granados, Maurice Ravel, Joaquín Rodrigo, Jules Massenet, Camille Saint-Saëns, and Friedrich Gulda, alongside music by Jewish composers such as Ernest Bloch and Salomon Sulzer, and contemporary Arab composers Marwan Abado and Mahmoud Abuwarda.

The concert opens with traditional Aramaic prayers sung by members of the Syriac Orthodox community of St. Mark’s Monastery of Jerusalem.

TICKETS

AUGUST 5, 8 PM

SHARED VOICES

Magnificat Institute of Music, Terra Sancta, Curia Hall, Old City, Jerusalem

Finale Concert of the “Dialogue-Academy 2026”

Since the very first year of Sounding Jerusalem, the festival has been in close collaboration with the Magnificat Institute of Music in Jerusalem’s Old City. Over the years, countless music students have been taught, supported, and inspired by festival artists — a process that has shaped both their artistic development and the spirit of the festival itself.

This ongoing exchange has become a core element of Sounding Jerusalem: a shared space where experience meets curiosity, and where the energy and passion for music are passed on to the next generation.

In Shared Voices, young students of the Magnificat Institute of Music perform together with the international tutors of the Dialogue-Academy 2026 in a collective final concert celebrating dialogue, learning, and musical encounter.

TICKETS

AUGUST 6, 8 PM

TWENTY YEARS OF SOUNDING JERUSALEM

Zimbalista Gallery, Shivat Zion 36, Tel Aviv

Guest Concert at Zimbalista Gallery

Erich Oskar Huetter – cello (Austria)
Armin Egger – guitar (Austria)

The Zimbalist Art Gallery is a place of encounter, openness, and the highest artistic standards — values that closely align with those of Sounding Jerusalem. This shared spirit makes it a natural and meaningful venue for the festival’s presence in Tel Aviv.

A Distillation of Twenty Years presents selected works that have accompanied Sounding Jerusalem throughout its artistic journey. Music from the European classical and Romantic tradition enters into dialogue with Jewish classical music and contemporary Arab compositions. Performed by cello and guitar, the programme reflects two decades of listening, encounter, and shared musical experience

TICKETS

About

Sounding Jerusalem is an European Chamber Music project produced at the top artistic quality, which surrounding the Austrian EU Council Presidency, was realized for the first time in the summer of 2006 in Jerusalem. Since then, the festival brought song through the Old City of Jerusalem several times already.

Impulse music festival

Founded, developed and led by Austrian cellist Erich Oskar Huetter, Sounding Jerusalem is a music festival for all people living in Jerusalem and the region around, irrespective of their ethnic, social and religious aìliation.

Intercultural dialogue

The aim of this concert series is to promote electrifying classical as well as innovative chamber music in inspiring surroundings as well as fostering intercultural dialogue that contributes towards the meeting, interaction and respectful communication between people from Europe and the Middle East.

Workshops

Workshops and seminars for young musicians are organized in cooperation with local institutions fostering high level artistic impulses and intercultural stimulation. Furthermore, young students of local music schools are actively incorporated into artistic activities, working and performing together with the festival’s international artists.

Exchange and discussions

Accompanied by internationally renowned European and local artists, extraordinary venues mainly in the Old City of Jerusalem are brought to life as concert halls which contribute towards a respectful, stimulating and communicative atmosphere being inevitable.

Artists

Erich Oskar Huetter

Christian Jungwirth

Armin Egger

Erich Oskar Huetter

Founder & Artistic Director

Austrian cellist Erich Oskar Huetter is the founder and Artistic Director of Sounding Jerusalem. As a soloist and chamber musician, he has performed in renowned concert halls across Europe and beyond, appearing under conductors including Daniel Barenboim and Julien Salemkour. His artistic work has taken him to leading venues such as the Musikverein Vienna, the Konzerthaus Vienna, the Beethoven-Haus Bonn, and the Jerusalem Music Centre.

For more than twenty years, Huetter has shaped Sounding Jerusalem as an international festival dedicated to artistic excellence, dialogue, and cultural encounter. He is also the founder and director of the socio-cultural initiative HAUSKULTUR in Styria, Austria, creating innovative projects that connect music, communities, and public space.

Tanja Schmid

Festival Organisation

Born in Graz, Austria, Tanja Schmid received her classical dance training at the Graz Opera under the direction of Diana Ungureanu. As a dancer and teacher, she has performed and taught internationally, with artistic engagements in Italy, South Africa, Angola, Zimbabwe, and Kosovo.

Alongside her artistic career, she recently completed a Master of Arts at the University of Graz, specialising in Health Promotion. At Sounding Jerusalem, Tanja Schmid is responsible for festival organisation and coordination. Her international experience, organisational precision, and interdisciplinary background provide the foundation that allows the festival’s artistic vision to become reality.

Astrid Schütz

Communications

Astrid Schütz has worked in communications for more than twenty-five years, creating content for print, web, and social media. She studied media in Graz and combines strategic communication with a strong sensitivity for storytelling.

At Sounding Jerusalem, she is responsible for editorial content, public communication, and visual documentation. Through both words and photography, she captures the festival’s atmosphere, focusing on the quiet moments, human encounters, and details that define its unique character.

Aurelia Huetter-Schmid

Festival Organisation

Aurelia Huetter-Schmid supports the organisational team of Sounding Jerusalem and represents a new generation growing up alongside the festival. A cellist herself, she is currently attending the German School Rome, where she combines her musical education with a strong interest in politics, art, and philosophy.

Having accompanied the festival from an early age, she contributes to its organisation with curiosity, commitment, and an international perspective, reflecting the values of openness, dialogue, and cultural exchange that have shaped Sounding Jerusalem from the very beginning.