stay SOUND & CHECK yourself

Katja Ehrenberg holds a PhD in psychology and is full professor at Psychology School, Hochschule Fresenius (Fresenius University of Applied Sciences) in Cologne, Germany, where she enjoys teaching B.Sc. and M.Sc. students in various courses. Her current research interests include stress and self-care, as well as topics of applied social psychology such as communication and conflict in teams, person perception, diversity management, and measures fostering autonomy, self-efficacy, creativity and flow experience. As a trained systemic counsellor (SG-certified), she offers workshops and coaching on these and similar issues for teams and organizations as well as for private clients. She has continuously provided scientific publications and conference talks on her research for over 20 years now. Being a passionate lover of alternative arts, music and culture, she is extremely grateful for Holger Schmidt to give her the chance to contribute to the GO Group conferences in 2016 and 2019, Nouvelle Prague 2019 and the European Festival Conference 2019, involving so many inspiring encounters and experiences which, for the time being, culminated in this book project. www.katjaehrenberg.de

HolgerJan Schmidt is one of Europe’s leading networkers in the music festival branch with a focus on sustainability and social responsibility. He leads the pan-european think tank GO Group (Green Operations Europe) and works as anchorman of YOUROPE, the European Festival Association. Holger is ambassador and project manager of the international Take A Stand initiative and campaign for the (live) music sector, which was launched in 2017 to create a movement encouraging social cohesion in our society as well as promoting awareness and tolerance. Holger looks back at more than twenty years working at Germany’s biggest admission-free festival RhEINKULTUR in Bonn with a daily audience of 160.000, being in a leading position from 1998 until the festival’s last edition in 2011. Today Holger is a booker, consultant and part of the management teams of various festivals among those DAS FEST in Karlsruhe and SUPERBLOOM Festival in Munich. He holds a diploma in media economics from Rheinische Fachhochschule Cologne and was a lecturer for “Sustainable Festival- and Eventmanagement” at Hochschule Fresenius (Fresenius University of Applied Sciences) in Cologne and Düsseldorf. Also he is an active musician himself. www.bnpd.de