Indie All-Stars Assembling For PEOPLE Fest

Eight years after its last edition, the sprawling, shape-shifting PEOPLE festival is returning to Berlin, and if its organizers have their way, the lineup will once again dispense with marquee billing in favor of unexpected collisions.

Set for Oct. 10-11 at Funkhaus Berlin, PEOPLE 2026 will reunite the artist-driven gathering first conceived in 2016 by The National’s Aaron and Bryce Dessner, Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon and collaborators as an antidote to the traditional festival experience. It was built around the idea of musicians spending a week creating together before unveiling the results, thus blurring the lines between rehearsal and performance.

That ethos remains intact. Organizers say 180 musicians are already trading ideas and songs in preparation for a week-long residency spread across 40 studios and creative spaces, culminating in some 200 performances across 12 stages over two marathon days. “Expect to be surprised, expect no one, find everyone,” they said.

Among the participants are the Dessners with fellow National members Bryan and Scott Devendorf, Portishead’s Adrian Utley, Kings of Convenience’s Erlend Øye and Eirik Glambek Bøe, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Nick Zinner and the Arcade Fire’s Richard Reed Parry, plus Damien Rice, Patrick Watson, Colin Stetson, Ben Howard, Bartees Strange, Helado Negro, Beirut’s Zach Condon, Lisa Hannigan and Owen Pallett.

“Many of these collaborations are fleeting: performances that premiere only once and may never happen again in the same form. What you’ll witness is music in its most immediate and unfiltered state: fragile, raw, collaborative and alive,” organizers enthused. “You will only find out who will play in a room when the stage lights turn on.”