Ensemble Musikfabrik is a contemporary music ensemble based in Cologne and has earned a reputation as one of the leading groups in its field. Musikfabrik was founded in 1990, and made its debut in 1991 at the Wittener Tage für neue Kammermusik under the name Ensemble Neue Musik Nordrhein-Westfalen. Ensemble Musikfabrik dedicates itself to performing new and unfamiliar compositions, many commissioned by the ensemble. Musikfabrik has built a close collaborative connection with guest artists including Louis Andriessen, Stefan Asbury, Richard Ayres, Harrison Birtwistle, Peter Eötvös, Vinko Globokar, Heiner Goebbels, Toshio Hosokawa, Nicolaus A. Huber, Mauricio Kagel, Helmut Lachenmann, Wolfgang Rihm, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Sasha Waltz and Hans Zender. The ensemble performs approximately eighty concerts a year in Germany and internationally, and presents a unique series of world premieres at the WDR in Cologne. Interdisciplinary projects with live electronics, dance, theatre, film, literature and the visual arts also serve to broaden the familiar conventions surrounding conducted ensemble concerts, as do chamber music concerts, debate concerts and improvisation. Last year they played with electronic artists Mouse on Mars, conductor André de Ridder and a group of percussion robots in the program Robots/Non/Robots.