Basel Chamber Orchestra

The Basel Chamber Orchestra was an orchestra founded in 1926 by the conductor and patron Paul Sacher . Sacher endeavored to create a repertoire for the then new type of chamber orchestra by commissioning compositions . It was particularly dedicated to older, pre-classical and 20th century music.

The ensemble was financed by the Basler Orchestergesellschaft (BOG) and the public sector, Paul Sacher contributed a quarter of a million Swiss francs annually. In 1986 the versatile musician Heinz Holliger was appointed chief conductor as the successor to the then 80-year-old Sacher, shortly afterwards Sacher announced without explanation that he would stop financing the chamber orchestra. The ensemble was subsequently dissolved.

This orchestra premiered many well-known musical works of the 20th century that Sacher had commissioned, including Béla Bartók's music for string instruments, percussion and celesta (1937), Richard Strauss ' Metamorphoses for 23 solo strings (1946), Igor Stravinski's Concerto in D (1947), further world premieres by Luciano Berio , Benjamin Britten , Elliott Carter , Henri Dutilleux , Hans Werner Henze , Paul Hindemith , Arthur Honegger , Ernst Krenek , Witold Lutosławski , Frank Martin , Bohuslav Martinů , Norbert Moret and many others. Performance and documentation material are kept by the Paul Sacher Foundation Basel. Arnold Schönberg , Alban Berg and Anton Webern never received a commission from Sacher.

In 1984 graduates from various Swiss music schools and former members of the Basel Chamber Orchestra brought the Basel Chamber Orchestra into being.

literature

Christoph Keller : The prevented publication: Paul Sacher on his 80th birthday. In: Magma. 7/8, 1986. Keller's text, originally written for Radio DRS (Radio of German and Rhaeto-Romanic Switzerland), had been rejected by the radio station.

Individual evidence

↑ cf. Paul Sacher Foundation ( Memento from May 6, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
↑ cf. Christoph Keller : The prevented publication: Paul Sacher on his 80th birthday. In: Magma. 7/8, 1986. Keller writes that the chamber orchestra is de facto largely a formation of the BOG .

[1] . Paul Sacher Foundation ( Memento from May 6, 2012 in the Internet Archive )

[2] . Christoph Keller : The prevented publication: Paul Sacher on his 80th birthday. In: Magma. 7/8, 1986. Keller writes that the chamber orchestra is de facto largely a formation of the BOG .