The second edition of isaCommunity, held on the mdw Campus and in the Music in Dialogue Hall (MiD-Saal) at Vienna’s Gasometer complex in July 2026, saw young musicians once again converge on Vienna. Sixteen participants from Europe, North and South America, and the Middle East spent an entire week here working at the interface between artistic practice and social engagement.

A Monday in December at the Vienna Gasometers. I’m moving between shops, escalators, and long glassed-in corridors. The four gasometer towers here can be viewed as something like a city-within-the-city, being home to around 1,500 people. Their approximately 220,000 m2 of floor space play host to residential flats, offices, retailers, and cultural offerings. It’s a place of everyday life—and it was precisely here that the fourth edition of the community music series “Grätzl Töne”, which I experienced as an enrolee in the music mediation course “Vermittlung von Musik”, played out

Dietmar Flosdorf, Axel Petri-Preis, and Rineke Smilde teach at the Department of Music Education Research, Music Didactics and Elementary Music Education (IMP). mdw Magazine spoke with them about the community work they pursue.

With projects like Musethica, the All Stars Inclusive Band, and Musik am Krankenbett [Music at the Sickbed], the mdw champions free access to the arts and culture—thereby elevating social responsibility to a central commitment.