In the spring of 2006 the four actors at Tg Stan (Jolente De Keersmaeker, Sara De Roo, Damiaan De Schrijver and Frank Vercruyssen) plan to make a new performance together without the participation of any outsiders; they have not done this since 1997. Itis called of / niet and it is based on texts by Harold Pinter and Alan Ayckbourn. Expect to a play and a performance with strong acting and a highly individual interpretation.

The dancer and choreographer Frank Bock and director and stage designer Simon Vicenzi examine such theatrical codes and concepts as movement, image and perception. To give an example, they work with blind people or blindfold their performers. What are the consequences for perception and what mechanisms develop to compensate? A strange theatre experience with lasting reverberations. Here, As If... is part of their cycle of invisible dances.

For many years Kathryn Bennetts was the right-hand of the top choreographer William Forsythe and is now artistic director of the Royal Ballet of Flanders, which is about to embark on a new chapter with her. In Uncontainable we see the work of five young choreographers, all of whom are finalists in an international competition. Each of them will create a short choreographic piece for six to eight dancers from the Royal Ballet of Flanders, in which the dance idiom may be either classical or contemporary The best choreography will win the Hapag-Lloyd Prize.

In this programme Capilla Flamenca presents twelve typical works from the Ars Nova repertoire (fourteenth century), as well as several secular works by Guillaume de Machaut, the absolute master of the Ars Nova. In compiling the programme Capilla Flamenca was inspired by the beautifully illustrated zodiac which Jean de Berry commissioned the Limburg brothers to paint. 

The musical expression of an obsession is perhaps the best way to sum up Jakob Lenz, an opera by the German composer Wolfgang Rihm. It is based on the short story by Georg Büchner about the schizophrenic poet, Jakob Lenz. Rihm’s passionate music is played by the Beethoven Academy and sung by members of the Teatro Colon chorus from Buenos Aires. The soloists are Hagen Matzeit, Lorenzo Caróla and Marek Gasztecki. Caroline Petrick is the director of this Muziektheater Transparant production.

A selection of recent work for viola, solo and duet.

The work by Lachenmann you will hear is Serynade, one of the great piano pieces of the end of the last century and a challenge to both performer and listener, a rich work that leaves a lasting impression. There is also work by Matthias Pintscher and Salvatore Sciarrino. The pianist Marino Formenti was praised by the Los Angeles Times as ‘a Glenn Gould for the 21st century’.

The opening concert of the Ars Musica Festival. Klangforum Wien is introducing the young composer and conductor Matthias Pintscher, together with two eminent and related composers: Helmut Lachenmann and Salvatore Sciarrino.

At last you will be able to see the production Jan Decorte, Sigrid Vinks and Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker presented at the 2005 Avignon Festival and for which Arno wrote the music. A masterpiece, wrote Jean-Marie Wynants in Le Soir, 'The work of an absolute poet who, without the slightest intellectualism, speaks directly to the people and all the beauty, truth, tenderness and horror they have in their lives.'

Alan Ayckbourn (1939) is well-known for the comedies which, with their light touch, make palpable the hidden pain in relationships. In Kruistochten (The Norman Conquests, 1973), he follows six characters in the course of a weekend. A theatrical epic, lasting almost five hours and packed with hilarious drama and bitter comedy. This, Van Hove's first Ayckbourn, was selected for the 2005 Theatre Festival.

A square in the city. Dozens of passers-by come and go. An urban choreography. The characters have no lines. In his version of  Peter Handke's play, the director Ruud Gielens is working with about thirty actors and musicians. With plenty of music and movement, they will be presenting an ode to the city, to Brussels.