Leipzig: where the bells first tolled for East Germany

Leipzig, with its colour, cheer and zest for the new, is a thrill for all the senses. A mecca for books, Bach and trade fairs – and with a university to boot – this dynamic hub in north-west Saxony fairly pulses with life. But Leipzig is also celebrated for its music and is known as the City of Heroes after the peaceful revolution of 1989, when prayers for peace at St. Nicholas' Church thrust it to the centre of world affairs.

Where 6,638 pipes set the perfect tone

Leipzig is a buzzing, vibrant centre of culture ranging from refined to hip and trendy. Goethe, who studied here, compared the city to Paris and – he added – not just because of the beautiful women. Maybe he had the Gewandhaus concert hall in mind as well, whose resident orchestra, founded back in 1743, was conducted and directed by Kurt Masur for many years. The hall's organ is particularly impressive. Its 6,638 pipes – the longest measuring 9.5 metres and the shortest 8 centimetres – provide the most magnificent sound. Or maybe he was thinking of the opera house: a musical venue celebrated as one of the oldest in Europe, thanks to its 300-year heritage, and renowned for its rich repertoire of great works from the baroque to the modern.

A home from home: Leipzig's oldest coffee house

The Old Town Hall in the market square is the centre of the city's old quarter and is considered one of the finest examples of late 16th century Renaissance architecture in Germany. Since 1909, the hall has housed a museum of the city's history that can boast around half a million exhibits. Also located in the old quarter is one of Europe's oldest coffee houses – Zum Arabischen Coffe Baum. Its 16 historical seating areas have been frequented by coffee connoisseurs since 1711, with Bach, Goethe, Schumann, Liszt, Lessing, Grieg, Wagner and even Napoleon and Augustus the Strong among those to have sampled its finest brews over the centuries.

Monuments to German reunification: St. Nicholas' Church and the Stasi headquarters

St. Nicholas' Church in the city centre is inextricably linked with the history of Leipzig and its people. In the GDR era, the church was a refuge for prayer and protest. Opponents of the East German regime first began meeting there for the Monday peace services in the autumn of 1982, eventually making the church a central focus of the peaceful revolution in 1989. The means employed by the GDR to halt these developments can be seen at another place of interest, the Runde Ecke or 'round corner' museum. Named after the rounded shape of the building's corner, this was where the Leipzig branch of the Ministry for State Security oversaw its huge spying and surveillance operations. The exhibition, entitled 'Stasi – Power and Banality', features documents, photographs and original tools of the trade, including body-scent archives, miniature cameras and bugs, which together give a powerful insight into the modus operandi of the GDR's Ministry for State Security, or Stasi.

For those in need of a bit of light relief after this, a tour of the bars in the nearby Barfussgässchen, just off the market square, is highly recommended. There are lots of other pubs dotted around the city centre and further to the west on Gottschedstrasse, plus a more alternative selection in the Südvorstadt district. A local beer speciality, the Gose, is a top-fermented, cloudy beer with a very distinctive taste. It would probably not be everybody's top choice, but it's definitely worth a try – just like all the other things the city has on offer.