Music everywhere! The princely court of Salzburg – a centre of European musical culture 1587 – 1807

Artistic direction of the exhibition

In 2020 the DomQuartier focuses on Salzburg’s great musical tradition, which is inseparably bound up with the history and the various rooms in the Residenz and the Cathedral precinct, as well as with Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber, Georg Muffat, Antonio Caldara, Leopold and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Michael Haydn – long before the inauguration of the Salzburg Festival. Glorious times, illustrious guests, opulent banquets and wonderful music – even then, during the reign of the prince-archbishops, Salzburg presented an international star-studded cast and major premières.

Knights Hall Works by Mozart
In the 17th and 18th centuries, festivities took place in the places you can visit today, including the Residenz (Carabinierisaal, Konferenzsaal, Thronsaal, Rittersaal), the Cathedral and of course the specially designed public squares. The DomQuartier explores this illustrious musical history in the original historical venues, starting from the reign (1587 – 1612) of Prince-Archbishop Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau who, with his new regulations for music at the court, created the basis of a long-flourishing music scene.

The designers of the exhibition – Virgil Widrich of checkpointmedia and Hans Kudlich of Studio Kudlich – have planned selective, site- and subject-specific, modern architectural interventions to bring alive for visitors’ imagination the historical scenes of festivities and music-making. It is the field of tension between historical building and recognisable reminiscence that renders the authenticity of these historical venues all the more perceptible.

19.7.2020 to 2.1.2022, DomQuartier Salzburg

Exhibition design
Artistic direction: Virgil Widrich, checkpointmedia
Exhibition design: Hans Kudlich, Andrea Itzinger
Planning and coordination: Viktoria Fuchs
Exhibition graphics: Carmen Leitner, Geoffrey Wirth
Editor: Sigrid Markl
Image research: Martin Reinhart
Animation videos: Oleg Prodeus
Sound design: Siegfried Friedrich
Media technology: Roland Babl, bablTech e.U.

Team DomQuartier Salzburg
Project management: Elisabeth Resmann
Curator: Sabine Krohn
Project coordination: Maria Herz
Musicological consulting: Gerhard Walterskirchen