Berlin festival Gaswerk Music Days, now in its third years, has unveiled the full programme for their 2025 event, which takes place over the weekends of 12 and 19 July. The festival is curated by the musical community of the Gaswerksiedlung, a block of century-old flats close to the River Spree in the east of the city that’s been converted into an art and creative hub, with performances taking place both indoors and in the gART.n outside area. The events over the two weekends happen under different themes, from ‘Improvisation, Exploration, Interaction’ to ‘Psychedelia and Experimental Electronics’ and a day-long focus on music tech and distribution.
This year there’s a focus on Nyege Nyege-related artists, as Gaswerk’s Stephan Kunze explains: “Gaswerk Music Days started as an experiment alongside 100 music studios and has become ever more experimental since. Most of our Afrocentric gigs on the first weekend are the result of recent collaborations with artists from Nyege Nyege in Uganda and might be finalised only on the day of the gig. This means quite some risk and added complexity in our preparations, but we are confident that it will create an unforgettable live experience.” This part of the programme will feature Queen Asher & Rehema Tajiri, Ibaaku, Awesome Tapes From Africa, Arsenal Mikebe, HHY & The Kampala Unit [pictured above] and Sonic Interventions, a Berlin-based group, all on the bill. Joining them will be Ndagga Rhythm Force, Vanishing Twin, Radwan Ghazi Moumneh of Jerusalem In My Heart, Shackleton and Appleblim and many more.
Gaswerk’s Andreas Voelk says that aim of the festival is to foster collaboration and encourage new work. “As a musician myself, I’m passionate about improvisation – about discovering, deconstructing, and recombining ideas in new ways,” he says, “That’s exactly what we do at the Gaswerk Music Days: we exchange perspectives, explore uncharted paths, and reframe music, themes, and genres in new contexts. This approach runs through the entire festival – most vividly, and almost radically, in the ‘Radical Music Lab’, a live recording studio for spontaneous creation and collaboration among the festival artists.”
