Songs of (In)Security

The hit show from Chemnitz, presented exclusively in its West German partner city of Düsseldorf — a concert performance that documents, invites reflection, and builds bridges.

For 2025 Capital of Culture Chemnitz, artist Tanja Krone posed a simple, open question: “Chemnitz, are you safe?” She spoke to people from security companies, the police, tradespeople and insurance companies, interviewed pensioners, schoolchildren, refugees and people she once knew. Her starting point was the city’s unusually high number of garages. The word garage comes from French and means “to bring something to safety”. The conversations revealed not only the mood of a city, but perhaps of an entire republic. The #3000Garagen project was created as part of the 2025 Capital of Culture Chemnitz and focused on the roughly 30,000 garages in the city. They were not only shelters for hard-won vehicles in the GDR, but also archives, workshops and personal retreats. The interviews were transcribed, shortened and re-edited, but retain their syntax, dialect and all their fractures. The result is a concert show that invites critical reflection on current German emotional worlds and is touring with the band “Die erste Sicherheitskonferenz des ehemaligen Ostens” (The First Security Conference of the Former East). Its first concert in the ‘West’ will take place exclusively for the Impulse Festival in Düsseldorf, which is twinned with Chemnitz. A musical experience that lies between concert and tragicomedy – humorous, polyphonic, poetic and documentary.