Dear audience, dear guests,

When BLAUES RAUSCHEN takes place for the fourth time this year in various cities of the Ruhr region and provides for experiments in the field of tension between analog and digital innovation, it is a special pleasure that Herne can once again be part of it. Already in 2017 and 2018, the artists, locally unheard until then, were a formative enrichment of the cultural offerings in our city. And it became clear that the question of the change in creative activity through technical developments should remain forward-looking.

This is also and especially true when successive and simultaneous crises threaten to determine our thoughts and actions. Unbridled creativity and the courage to leave familiar paths are among the forces that can help a society to successfully search for alternatives and ways out.

And even in the field of computer-based electronic music, improvisation and reacting to special moments during live performance sometimes play a formative role – a talent that is increasingly in demand in large parts of society and its tasks. Thus, it is to be hoped that the artists and their audience will be able to use the certainly intense encounters in Herne‘s „Altem Wartesaal“ to allow new energy to emerge and to mutually exchange impulses. We are looking forward to experiencing these dynamic processes „live“ together again with excitement and anticipation. And also that a few weeks later the radio will say „…recorded at the festival BLAUES RAUSCHEN in Herne“.

I wish all participants and festival guests here and in our neighboring cities stimulating and successful festival days.

Andreas Merkendorf
Councillor for Education, Culture, Children-Youth-Family Herne