Uckermark Music Weeks — Concert Altkünkendorf

Renaissance Music in the Uckermark

The Uckermark Music Weeks are one of the oldest and most renowned classical music festivals in northeastern Germany. For years, they have filled the small fieldstone churches, castles, and monastery ruins of the Uckermark — that vast, sparsely populated lake district in northern Brandenburg on the Polish border — every summer and early autumn. One of the venues in 2026 is the Altkünkendorf Village Church, a district of the town of Angermünde in the Uckermark district.

Ensemble astrophil & stella — Faustus Brought to Life

On Sunday, August 23, 2026, at 4:00 p.m., the ensemble astrophil & stella will present its program „The Fallen Angels of Doctor Faustus". The piece is based on the famous Historia von D. Johann Fausten, published in Frankfurt am Main in 1587 by Johann Spies — one of the earliest German-language adaptations of the Faust legend, long before Goethe. The ensemble combines vocal and instrumental Renaissance music with spoken passages from Faust to create a chamber music drama lasting approximately 60 to 70 minutes.

The Ensemble

The ensemble brings together soloists from the European early music scene:

• Charlotte Nachtsheim — Soprano
• Cyril Escoffier — Tenor
• Filipa Mota de Meneses — Viola da Gamba
• Vincent Kibildis — Gothic harps, recitation
• Johanna Bartz — Renaissance transverse flutes, recitation

The combination of gamba, Gothic harps, and transverse flutes creates a soundscape rarely heard since the late Middle Ages — the Altkünkendorf village church, with its medieval acoustics, is an ideal resonance space.

Altkünkendorf and the Uckermark

Altkünkendorf is a tiny district of Angermünde, located in the Schorfheide-Chorin Biosphere Reserve in the Uckermark district of the state of Brandenburg. The small 13th-century fieldstone church is part of the classic concert circuit of the Uckermark Music Weeks — listening here offers not only the concert but also the rural tranquility of the North Brandenburg landscape, for which the Uckermark provides one of its most beautiful backdrops.

The Uckermark Music Weeks 2026

The concert in Altkünkendorf is one of dozens of concerts in the 2026 season — spread across churches and castles in Prenzlau, Templin, Angermünde, Lychen, Greiffenberg, Boitzenburg, and many other locations in the Uckermark. The full program will be published on the festival website.