Cologne has several museums. The famous Roman-Germanic Museum features art and architecture from the city's distant past; the Museum Ludwig houses one of the most important collections of modern art in Europe, including a Picasso collection matched only by the museums in Barcelona and Paris. The Schn�tgen Museum of religious art is housed in St. Cecilia, one of Cologne's Twelve Romanesque churches. Several orchestras are active in the city, among them the G�rzenich Orchestra and the WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne, both based at the Cologne Philharmonic Orchestra Building. Other orchestras are the Musica Antiqua K�ln, as well as several choirs, including the WDR Rundfunkchor K�ln. Cologne was also an important centre of electronic music in the 1950s (Studio f�r elektronische Musik, Karlheinz Stockhausen) and again from the 90s onward. The public radio and TV station WDR was involved in promoting musical movements such as Krautrock in the 70s; the influential Can was formed there in 1968. There are several centres of nightlife, among them the Kwartier Lat�ng (the student quarter around the Z�lpicher Stra�e) and the nightclub-studded areas around Hohenzollernring, Friesenplatz and Rudolfplatz.
The large annual literary festival Lit.Cologne features regional and international authors. The main literary figure connected with Cologne is writer Heinrich B�ll, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature.
Cologne is well known for its beer, called K�lsch. K�lsch is also the name of the local dialect. This has led to the common joke of K�lsch being the only language one can drink.
Cologne is also famous for Eau de Cologne (German: K�lnisch Wasser; lit: Water of Cologne), a perfume created by Italian expatriate Johann Maria Farina at the beginning of the 18th century. During the 18th century this perfume became increasingly popular, was exported all over Europe by the Farina family and Farina became a household name for Eau de Cologne. In 1803 Wilhelm
