The Bergen International Festival is Scandinavia’s flagship celebration of music and the performing arts. Established in 1953 as part of a postwar movement to foster cultural exchange across borders, the festival quickly grew into a vital Nordic cultural hub. Over three-quarters of a century, it has established itself as an important international crossroads, where deeply rooted artistic traditions meet bold, contemporary creations.
In 2027, the Bergen International Festival celebrates its 75th jubilee edition, running from 26 May to 12 June. The anniversary programme looks to the future while honouring the festival’s origins, with a Jubilee Opening Concert inspired by the inaugural 1953 programme and featuring the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra and pianist Leif Ove Andsnes in Grieg’s Piano Concerto. Thirty years after being named Festival Musician in 1997, aged 18, Andsnes returns as Artist in Residence, becoming the first musician in the festival’s history to hold the title more than once.

True to its legacy of staging monumental works, the 75th edition places opera and large-scale collaborative performance at its core. The centerpiece of the season is a new staging of Edvard Fliflet Bræin’s Anne Pedersdotter (1971), a landmark work widely regarded as Norway’s national opera. Directed by Maren Bjørseth and conducted by Edward Gardner, the production brings the full ensemble, chorus and orchestra of the Norwegian National Opera & Ballet from Oslo to Bergen. The festival’s ongoing commitment to avant-garde experimentation is also embodied in Fønix (Phoenix), a dark collaboration between playwright Lisa Lie and composer Stian Westerhus that fuses theatre and opera.

Beyond the opera stage, the 75th-anniversary programme brings together international collaborations, community-focused events and musical installations across the city. Highlights already announced include Scottish Ballet’s performance of Crystal Pite’s Emergence, a 24-hour marathon of Erik Satie’s Vexations, and Ritual, a collaboration between cellist Yo-Yo Ma and Icelandic art studio / production house marvaða. Created in response to today’s global climate challenges, Ritual brings Yo Yo Ma together with the BIT20 Ensemble, soloists, choir and young cellists from the Festival Academy of Bergen in excerpts from Völuspá, the folk song Fagurt er í fjörðum and a prologue by Icelandic author Andri Snær Magnas.

At 75, the Bergen International Festival remains defined by this dual identity: a custodian of Nordic artistic heritage and an active catalyst for the future of the performing arts.