Much more than half the world’s population lives in cities today. This alone makes the city an object of social and scientific interest. Since time immemorial cities have exerted a power of attraction that fills people with hope for the fulfillment of their yearnings. Cities are an expression of wealth, private happiness and homecoming, but also of loneliness, poverty and violence. Architectural exhibitions on themes such as Multiple City and New Urbanity in Munich and Frankurt reflect the growing significance of urban centers.

Composers have also fallen under the spell of cities: Hanns Eisler, for example, wrote music to „Dans les rues“ by Victor Trivas, a socio-critical film that shows Paris at the time of the global stock-market crash. From his exile in the United States, Eisler described the Los Angeles of the 1930s and 40s as an involuntary meeting place of emigrés in his Hollywood Elegien. Eisler’s relationship with his native city was broken when he returned to Germany in 1949, and the „Leipziger Sinfonie“ remained a fragment. Siegfried Matthus, a composition student of Eisler’s, wrote the „Dresdner Sinfonie“ for the celebration of the 20th anniversary of the GDR. His „Manhattan Concerto“, written 24 years later, speaks an entirely different musical language. Adriana Hölszky was also inspired by the pulsating metropolis in her musical stage work Der gute Gott von Manhattan (2003/04). In „Sinfonie einer Stadt“, Jürg Baur meditated on the 1,100-year history of the city of Duisburg. And in the project „into...“ of the Ensemble Modern and the Siemens Arts Program, composers such as Jörg Birkenkötter and Márton Illés are attempting a musical approach to the cities of Johannesburg and Dubai after lengthy study stays there.