46th Jazzfestival Saalfelden, August 20–23, 2026: Special Projects and New Sonic Spaces

MMM: A Score as a Living Organism

With “WAS___,” MMM (Maja Osojnik, Mathia*s Lenz, and Matija Schellander) present at the Kunsthalle Saalfelden the beginning of a ten-year journey through space and sound. The point of departure is a 66-meter-long graphic score that understands itself less as a completed work than as an open, constantly evolving system.

Printing techniques, tape recordings, loudspeakers, and performative interventions merge into an experimental arrangement situated somewhere between installation, concert, and acoustic trace collection. Together with percussionist Špela Mastnak, this gives rise to a fragile, physical sound world in which touch, materiality, and micro-noises move to the center. The audience itself becomes part of a process that continues to grow with every performance.

The Big Shake: A Homecoming Anniversary for Shake Stew

Entirely different in character, yet conceived just as collectively, is the anniversary project by Shake Stew. When the band performed the opening concert of the Jazzfestival Saalfelden in 2016, it marked the beginning of an extraordinary success story, and today the septet counts among the defining formations of the European jazz scene, receiving distinctions including the German Jazz Prize 2021 and the Amadeus Austrian Music Award 2023.

To mark the group’s tenth anniversary, Lukas Kranzelbinder now returns with a large-scale project developed especially for Saalfelden. Under the title “The Big Shake – A Saalfelden Homecoming,” Bürgermusik Saalfelden and the Eisenbahner Stadtkapelle combine their sonic worlds with the music of Shake Stew, forming a musical parade of around 70 performers that will move through the town on Saturday from 2 pm, beginning at Rathausplatz, continuing to the Congress center and onward into the park. At 3 pm, a grand finale will follow there: first featuring the two Saalfelden brass bands, before Shake Stew takes over the Park Stage in its customary line-up.

Strikingly Present: Distinguished Female Pianists at the Piano

This year, distinguished female musicians set essential accents within the program, with Marta Sanchez, Marina Džukljev, Tamara Stefanovich, and Eve Risser among several internationally acclaimed pianists appearing on stage. Their concepts range from finely etched composition to free improvisation and radical sonic research, and it is precisely these differing aesthetic approaches that underscore the artistic breadth of the festival.

Main Stage Between Commissioned Composition and Sonic Research

Once again, the Jazzfestival Saalfelden places its main stage program in the hands of distinctive artistic voices and musical openness. Yvonne Moriel presents “Strange Motion,” a commissioned composition created especially for the Jazzfestival Saalfelden. The new project moves between jazz, chamber music, and experimental sonic research, and counts among the festival’s central world premieres.

What follows is a contrasting arc extending from the subtle sensitivity of the Henriette Eilertsen Trio to the dense complexity of the Marta Sanchez Quintet, and onward to the intense musical dialogue between Andreas Schaerer and Daniel Garcia.

Saturday once again stands under the sign of powerful ensembles and musical openness. Opposing the avant-garde project “SDLW” around Tamara Stefanovich are the finely balanced Sheen Trio and the orchestral layering of Dag Magnus Narvesen’s octet “DAMANA.” This is followed by the transatlantic summit meeting between Darius Jones and Otomo Yoshihide, before the Chicago Underground Duo ultimately pursues its complex musical visions.

On Sunday, the trio “Industriesalon” around Marina Džukljev opens the main stage program. Afterwards, the cinematically forceful formation “Ye Olde 2” by trombonist Jacob Garchik and the intercultural duo “Thousand Leaves” take over as further stations of the day. The closing point is finally set by the revival of Chris Speed’s legendary quartet “YEAH NO,” which carries the New York downtown sound of the turn of the millennium into the present.

New Spaces, Night Programs, and Alpine Resonances

Away from the large stages, the festival opens new spaces, and for the first time two solo concerts will take place at the Museum Schloss Ritzen. The Polish project “Zbigniew – NO ANGRY songs” and Delphine Joussein’s solo work “Calamity” promise intense and immediate concert experiences.

At the Otto-Gruberhalle, the paths of the most diverse sonic free spirits once again intersect, and acts such as Mel*E, Brique “La danse du béton,” Trunk, and Earthball open spaces deep into the night between club culture, noise, improvisation, and electronic music. In doing so, the expanded late-night program responds to the high audience numbers of previous years’ Nexus+ concerts and offers musical discoveries in the hall until 1 am. The later program points help ease visitor flows, while the legendary Nexus Bar can once again serve equally as an open and relaxed meeting point for everyone involved.

Alpine Resonances and Urban Tracks

The popular “We Hike Jazz” excursions once again combine the experience of nature with the concert format. While Lukas Kranzelbinder leads the first tour on Thursday, August 20, as a secret festival overture, saxophonist Anna Tsombanis takes over the second hike on Saturday. Both tours are already fully booked.

Two alpine hut concerts complement the program outside the classical venues and extend the jazz context outward into the alpine landscape: the ensemble Klakradl and the quartet Tini Trampler & Playbackdolls combine jazz, Wienerlied, pop, and performance with unrestrained joy in playing. A particular highlight is also promised by the concert at the historic hermitage above Schloss Lichtenberg, where saxophonist Chris Speed and trumpeter Cuong Vu create a contemplative counterpoint to the musical bustle in the valley.

Throughout the town, the freely accessible City Tracks invite spontaneous musical discoveries, while the Short Cuts offer compact concert experiences marked by stylistic openness. In the two projects Christoph Cech & oenm and Stefanovich / Dell / Lillinger / Westergaard, improvised music encounters contemporary music, while formations such as the Lava Quartet and DaughterDaughter complete the musical spectrum. The ticketed concert series Shortcuts is already sold out.

Thus, Saalfelden remains in 2026 a festival that not only presents jazz, but understands it as a social, spatial, and artistic practice.

Service and Ticketing

The response to this year’s festival has been tremendous, and the musical hikes “We Hike Jazz” to the Asitz and the Steinalm, as well as the Shortcuts passes, are already sold out. Mainstage tickets are still available, and the VIP option for an extended festival experience can also still be booked here.

As a digital companion, the free JAZZ SAALFELDEN app brings together all essential information directly on visitors’ smartphones. Thanks to regular push notifications, audiences remain up to date with current events and short-notice updates at all times.