The Top 11 Music Venues in Cologne

The Tanzbrunnen is an open-air venue in Cologne. The outdoor event and leisure park on the right side of the Rhine river holds roughly 12,500 people. In the summer months, bands play on the open-air stage, the music drifting across the 89,500-square-feet area to the neighbouring Rheinpark. From the front terraces, you also have an excellent view of Cologne’s skyline.

The Gloria theatre in central Cologne has a 60-year history of (pornographic) film screenings, wild parties, comedy festivals and concerts. Today, it’s one of the city’s hippest nightclubs, but the location is still used for all kinds of events, including lectures during lit.Cologne and concerts. Coldplay, Oasis, Kings of Leon and the Foo Fighters have all performed here in recent years.

The Protestant church in the Cologne Nippes quarter was built in 1889 and is one the few examples of Gothic Revival architecture in the city. Today, it’s not only a place of worship but also a space for cultural events. Throughout the year, people congregate here for lectures, comedy events and acoustic concerts.

The E-Werk holds 2,000 people and is the sister venue to the Palladium just across the street. In 1989, Cologne band BAP purchased the former electricity plant and, together with their business partners, invested millions to renovate the building to create a new event space. The heritage-protected location hosts hundreds of events each year. Bush, Weezer and The War on Drugs are all due to play here in the coming months.

Located in the beautiful park of the same name, the Stadtgarten venue is known for hosting more than 400 cultural events each year. There are two rooms in this venue, with the larger having a capacity for 400 people and the smaller for 200 – both host a range of contemporary musicians. The focus is on jazz, but newcomers of experimental pop and rock perform here too. On party nights, electro, funk and soul sound through the rooms.