The CSO and van Zweden right at home in Dresden, Germany’s city of culture

After a two-night stand in Hamburg, Germany, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra headed south to Dresden for the next stop on its European Tour 2025. The concert Monday night at Dresden’s Kulturpalast (Palace of Culture) also marked the CSO’s debut at the venue. 

Presented by the Dresdner Musikfestspiele (Dresden Music Festival), one of Europe’s largest and most acclaimed classical music festivals, the concert featured the CSO and conductor Jaap van Zweden in Mahler’s Seventh Symphony, known for its unusual instrumentation, including a mandolin and guitar.

Hailed as a city of culture, Dresden is famous as a classical music hub, with the Semperoper opera house, the Dresden Staatskapelle, the Dresden Philharmonic and the Kreuzchor boys’ choir all based there. The Kulturpalast, which opened in 1969, was built in the International Style, which dominated 19th-century architecture from the 1920s to the 1970s. 

Designed by Wolfgang Hänsch when Dresden was part of the German Democratic Republic, the Kulturpalast was the nation’s largest multi-purpose hall when it opened. The building underwent extensive recnovation beginning in 2012 and reopened with a new concert hall in April 2017.

Cinemaphiles might recognize the Kulturpalast from the film “Tár” (2022), which was shot there in part and features musicians from the Dresden Philharmonic. 

For the trip to Dresden, CSO musicians boarded a charter flight, which was decked with custom headrest covers saluting Heidi Lukas, the CSO’s director of operations, for her three decades of service. Lukas, who’s making her 55th tour with this trip, has decided to step down after this season.

After Dresden, the CSO moved on to Prague (May 20) in the Czech Republic and Wrocław (May 22-23) in Poland, with a return on May 24 to Chicago.