Throughout 2017, Southbank Centre and the London Philharmonic Orchestra present a new festival which explores what it means to be human.

Since the Age of Enlightenment and the subsequent revelations of science and technology, reason has challenged faith. Yet despite rational explanations for so many of religion’s core beliefs, the 21st century looks set to be defined by religion, often in extreme forms.

The seemingly innate need in so many people to find meaning for their lives and a sense of where they fit into the universe, with all its mystery and majesty, is a constant in all periods of human history and has produced some of the greatest music and art ever created.

Belief and Beyond Belief explores the music, art, culture, science, philosophy, ritual and traditions that have risen out of religion in its many guises.

The festival also looks at the broader questions of what it means to be human and asks which aspects of religious belief can be useful to the world in the 21st century. What are the risks to societies if they become more secular, and how will that influence artists?

From Haydn to Strauss, from Kancheli to Glass, Belief and Beyond Belief looks at music that speaks of the divine and the human spirit.

From Richard Dawkins to Jeanette Winterson, from Rabindranath Tagore to Primo Levi, we investigate the struggle to define the absolute.

Nearly all of the London Philharmonic Orchestra’s 2017 Royal Festival Hall concerts form part of this Festival, alongside a wide range of performances, lectures, debates, and literary events programmed by Southbank Centre.

'The belief in something greater than ourselves has preoccupied humanity for centuries. In this festival of music inspired by spiritual belief, we attempt to lay open the grandeur, enigma and conflict in our search for, and understanding of, the divine.'
The London Philharmonic Orchestra’s Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor, Vladimir Jurowski.