Sat, May 9, 2026
SOLD OUT: Pulse Festival: Ólafsson & Eliasson - Goldberg Variations

There are concerts you don't easily forget. Such was the case when Víkingur Ólafsson played Bach's monumental Goldberg Variations at the Lucerne Festival in the summer of 2023, performing them in a way that had likely never been heard before: as a vibrant, world-encompassing spectacle, bringing to life a diverse array of voices and characters and exploring the full spectrum of emotions. He then toured with this work, presenting it around 100 times worldwide. "Afterwards, I let the Goldberg Variations, which are very, very close to my heart, rest for a while to find a new approach," Víkingur explains. And in doing so, he came up with a striking idea. For the opening of Lucerne Festival Pulse, which he will curate for three years, he and his compatriot, the acclaimed visual artist Olafur Eliasson, are creating Bach's magnum opus as a total work of art, combining sound and light projection. The intimate setting for this 90-minute journey through space and time is the Pius Church in Meggen, with its delicate, translucent marble walls. Olafur Eliasson's new, site-specific light installation will react in real time to Víkingur's playing, ensuring that each of the three performances unfolds differently. "I don't yet know what the outcome will be," admits Víkingur. "But that should be the spirit of the festival: to embrace the unexpected."

Program:
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750)
Aria with Various Variations BWV 988 Goldberg Variations
With Olafur Eliasson's new light installation The Shadows of Sounds and the Unforeseeable Shapes of Love

This concert has no intermission.