Axel Brüggemann was born in Bremen in 1971. He works as an author, presenter and director. Brüggemann has produced numerous documentaries for ZDF, arte, 3Sat, NDR, WDR and SKY (including the series “Epochen der Musikgeschichte” and the film “Der Ringkämpfer”). He also appears as a presenter in numerous documentary series, television shows and concert formats. Brüggemann was nominated for the Grimme Prize and awarded the Bavarian Television Prize for his presentation and the concept for “Bayreuth die Show” (SKY). His cinema film “Wagner, Bayreuth und der Rest der Welt” was nominated for the German Documentary Film Prize.

Brüggemann studied history, art history and musicology in Freiburg. From 2001 to 2008, he was first an editor and then head of copy at Welt am Sonntag. He has written for Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung, Stern, Focus and Jüdische Allgemeine, among others. He has also worked for radio stations such as the BBC, Deutschlandfunk and WDR and for Klassik-Radio. He designs and hosts the weekly classical music podcast “Alles klar, Klassik?” for the Bertelsmann Foundation. Brüggemann’s “Klassik-Woche” at Crescendo is the most important classical music newsletter in the German-speaking world.

Brüggemann has published numerous books with publishers such as Beltz & Gelberg, Rowohlt, Bärenreiter and Eichborn (including biographies of Richard Wagner and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, the music history “Wie Krach zu Musik wird”, a biography of the conductor Franz Welser-Möst and books on society and politics such as “Landfrust”).

Brüggemann recently published the book “Die Zwei-Klassik-Gesellschaft” for FAZ-Buchverlag. The children’s music series “Der kleine Hörsaal”, which Brüggemann produced for Deutsche Grammophon was honoured with the ECHO-Klassik award. Brüggemann lives in Bremen and Vienna.

Presenter for the concerts on 24 and 25 August 2024