Helsinki Music Week turns the city into a stage

Helsinki Music Week returned for its second edition with a programme that treated the city less as a backdrop than as part of the performance. Across five days, from 13 to 17 May, the festival moved through churches, clubs, theatres and a public sauna, placing experimental music in direct contact with Helsinki’s architecture and nightlife. For visitors, the format offered a route through the city. For locals, it reframed familiar places. Temppeliaukio Church, Helsinki Cathedral, Dance House Helsinki, Ääniwalli, Post Bar and Kulttuurisauna each carried a different part of the programme, from ambient and organ works to rap, club music, panels and sauna sound pieces.