‘Open your ears for Hanau!’ Encounter concert against racism and marginalisation
With the encounter concert ‘Ohren auf für Hanau!’ on 11 February 2025 in the presence of Minister of State for Culture Claudia Roth and Serpil Temiz Unvar, the founder of the ‘Ferhat Unvar Education Initiative’, the Hanns Eisler School of Music Berlin, together with the Initiative for Cultural Integration at the German Cultural Council and the Federal Association for Music Education, is setting an example against racism and exclusion.
At this year's ‘Hanau Action Day’, around 100 pupils and their music teachers will present selected contributions from the Germany-wide school competition ‘Ohren auf für Hanau!’. To commemorate the attack in Hanau, they intensively explored the topics of racism, anti-Semitism, right-wing extremism and other forms of group-focused enmity.
The encounter concert is dedicated to the memory of the nine victims of the racially motivated attack in Hanau on 19 February 2020: Gökhan Gültekin, Sedat Gürbüz, Said Nesar Hashemi, Mercedes Kierpacz, Hamza Kurtović, Vili Viorel Păun, Fatih Saraçoğlu, Ferhat Unvar and Kaloyan Velkov. Six other people were injured in the attack. In order not to forget the victims of the attack and to send a clear signal against all forms of racism and discrimination, Minister of State for Culture Claudia Roth and the Initiative for Cultural Integration launched the nationwide ‘Hanau Action Day’ with artistic school competitions.
The pupils and their teachers from eight different federal states spent three days in Berlin, exchanging ideas with representatives of civil society. At the encounter concert at the Hanns Eisler School of Music Berlin, ten live musical performances composed and staged by the pupils themselves as well as video performances will be shown and heard.
More about the day of action on the website of the Initiative kulturelle Integration