Bavarian Radio Choir

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Bavarian Radio Choir
Logo BRChor.jpg
Seat: Munich / Germany
Carrier: Bavarian radio
Founding: 1946
Genus: mixed choir
Founder: Robert Seiler
Head : Howard Arman
Voices : 49 ( SATB )

The Bavarian Radio Choir in Munich is a mixed choir that, as a radio choir , is part of the Bavarian Radio Orchestra .

Profile of the choir

The choir comprises 49 permanent professional singers and can be increased to a size of 100 singers if necessary. It is characterized by its tonal homogeneity and its stylistic versatility, which encompasses all areas of choral singing from medieval motets to contemporary works, from oratorios to operas. The choir is headed by an artistic director. The choir's chief conductor is also the chief conductor of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra. Accordingly, the choir was significantly influenced by the arts, not only by the choirmaster, but also by the previous chief conductors Eugen Jochum , Rafael Kubelík , Sir Colin Davis , Lorin Maazel and Mariss Jansons . As part of the orchestra of the Bavarian Radio, the choir plays primarily with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Munich Radio Orchestra . The choir also appears together with the symphony orchestras of other ARD stations and gives guest appearances in top European orchestras such as the Berlin or Munich Philharmonic and the Lucerne Festival Orchestra . With contemporary works and world premieres, the choir sets interpretative accents at musica viva as well as in its own subscription concert series. There are also performances of compositions that are not performed so frequently, such as by Carola Bauckholt , Georg Friedrich Haas , Adriana Hölszky , Gija Kantscheli , James MacMillan , Arvo Pärt , Krzysztof Penderecki , Wolfgang Rihm , Sven-David Sandström , Valentin Silvestrov , Karlheinz Stockhausen and Hans Zender .

history

Choir from 1924

The official founding date is May 1, 1946. But similar to the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Munich Radio Choir has a history that goes back to the beginnings of the Munich radio station. Today's Münchner Rundfunkchor emerged from the vocal ensemble, which was founded in 1924 in the year the “German Hour in Bavaria” was founded and which initially consisted of 28 singers. In August 1924, the first symphony concert with the "Great Radio Orchestra and the Choir of the German Hour in Bavaria" went over the transmitter. However, the recording quality was not particularly satisfactory. The Bayerische Radio-Zeitung of November 30th commented:

"There is no doubt that it is extremely difficult to bring the sound of the individual choir voices, in which any diversity in the character of the voices is intensified in a blatant form, to a common denominator."

But that soon changed, in particular due to a special arrangement of different microphones. From then on, the radio choir became an integral part of the performances of classical music by the orchestra and choir of the Munich radio station.

First choirmaster

The first artistic director of the radio choir was Herbert Erlenwein. He was a student of Hans Knappertsbusch , Joseph Haas and Siegmund von Hausegger . In addition to the choir, from January 1925 to August 1927 he also directed the radio orchestra of the Munich radio station, which was also founded in 1924. After Erlenwein, the organist Gustav Schoedel temporarily led the choir and orchestra. Eduard Zengerle followed in 1928. He first conducted the choir and orchestra on September 28, 1928.

Re-establishment in 1946

As the first of the three ensembles of the Bavarian Radio, the BR Choir was founded in 1946, the first year after the end of the war. It began when Robert Seiler, as artistic director, brought a 28-person ensemble of professional singers together into a choir and, on May 1, 1946, founded the choir of “Radio Munich”, the predecessor of today's Bayerischer Rundfunk. Just one year later, the choir had 36 members. In 1948 it was expanded to 40 singers.

1950s

After Robert Seiler accepted a call to director of the Nuremberg Conservatory in 1949, the Bavarian Broadcasting Company appointed Josef Kugler as artistic director of the Munich Radio Choir. Kugler previously worked at the Bavarian State Opera under Clemens Kraus. A fruitful collaboration developed with Eugen Jochum , chief conductor of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, founded on July 1, 1949. Up until 1949, vocal studio productions, from madrigals to cantets and oratorios, were in the foreground. Kubelik tied the choir and orchestra more closely together. Alongside the symphony orchestra, the choir traveled to the Salzburg Festival in 1951 with a performance of Orff's Catulli carmina , and a year later it gave an a cappella concert at the “International Music Weeks” in Konstanz. Also in 1951, Igor Stravinsky conducted the Bavarian Radio Choir and Symphony Orchestra with his own works, including Oedipus Rex . 1953 started the series of Sunday concerts in Munich, in which the radio choir regularly appears. The performance of Claudio Monteverdi's Vespers of Mary on the occasion of the Wiener Festwochen in 1957 attracted a lot of attention . One of the highlights of the joint work of the choir and symphony orchestra was the opening ceremony of the Munich Hercules Hall in 1953 and the joint performance of Handel's Israel Oratorio in Egypt in 1959 under Eugen Jochum .

1960s

After Josef Kugler's death in 1958, the Bavarian Broadcasting Corporation appointed Kugler's assistant Kurt Prestel as artistic director of the Munich Radio Choir. During the Prestel era, he changed the position of chief conductor of the choir and symphony orchestra of the Bavarian Radio. 1961 followed Eugen Jochum by Rafael Kubelík. In 1963 Wolfgang Schubert became the artistic director of the choir. He was the first choir director to hold a longer term in office. With Kubelik and Schubert, a new era of intensive collaboration between choir and symphony orchestra began. Examples are choral symphonic performances of Benjamin Britten's War Requiem , Igor Stravinsky's Psalmensymphonie or Paul Hindemith's Mathis der Maler . Other highlights in this decade were performances of works by Arnold Schönberg , including A Survivor from Warsaw .

1970s

At the beginning of this epoch, the choir traveled to Rome on May 23, 1970. For the 50th anniversary of Pope Paul VI as a priest. Wolfgang Sawallisch directed the Bavarian Radio Choir and the Italian Radio Orchestra. The television broadcast of the Concerto per il papa , directed by Franco Zeffirelli, reached 350 million viewers worldwide. Another highlight was the performance of Olivier Messiaen's Transfiguration de Notre-Seigneur Jésus-Christ in 1971 on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the radio choir. For the complete recording of Hans Pfitzner's Oprt Palestrina , which took place one year later, the Bavarian Radio Choir and Symphony Orchestra received the 1973 German Record Prize. Two new choirmasters were formative during this time, Erich Mende and Josef Schmidhuber . Mende was previously at the Stuttgart State Opera, Schmidhuber came from church music.

1980s

After Rafael Kubelik's contract expired in 1979, the Bavarian Radio Choir and Symphony Orchestra remained without a chief conductor until 1983. The designated 1982 deceased new chief conductor Kirill Kondrashin conducted on March 7, 1981 before his planned inauguration as single concert with the participation of the Rundfunkchor the Symphony no. 13 by Shostakovich . In 1983 Colin Davis conducted Beethoven's Missa solemnis on October 6, 1983 at the beginning of his activity as chief conductor of the choir and symphony orchestra . 1986 Hans-Peter Rauscher succeeded Gordon Kember as artistic director of the choir. On the occasion of the fall of the Berlin Wall, Leonard Bernstein conducted the performance of Beethoven's 9th Symphony on December 23 and 25, 1989 in Berlin with the participation of the BR Radio Choir .

1990s

In 1990 Michael Gläser took up his position as artistic director of the choir. He worked in this role for 15 years until 2005, making him the longest-serving director of the BR Radio Choir. In the same year Leonard Bernstein conducted his last concert before his death with the choir and symphony orchestra of the BR in the Stiftsbasilika Waldsassen, Mozart's C minor Mass . Under the direction of Lorin Maazel , chief conductor of the choir and symphony orchestra from 1993, the world premiere of Penderecki's 7th Symphony (Seven Gates of Jerusalem) took place on the occasion of the "Jerusalem 3000 Year" celebration . In 1998 the choir set up its own subscription series. It offers five concerts per season.

From 2000

In 2003, with Mariss Jansons as the new chief conductor of the choir and symphony orchestra, a new era began for the ensembles of Bavarian Radio. At the beginning of the 2005/2006 season, Dutchman Peter Dijkstra, born in 1978, took over the position of Artistic Director from his predecessor Michael Gläser.

In 2005 Nikolaus Harnoncourt made his debut with Schumann's Das Paradies und die Peri on the podium of the choir and symphony orchestra. In 2008 Peter Dijkstra conducted Handel's Israel in Egypt , also released on CD. In 2009, in the anniversary concert for the 60th anniversary of the symphony orchestra, Jansons conducted Arnold Schönberg's Gurre-Lieder . In the same year the choir and BR Symphony Orchestra gave a guest concert in the Dresden Frauenkirche , shortly after its reconstruction, under the direction of Peter Dijkstra. This was followed in 2010 by the choir's guest concerts in Berlin and Salzburg with the Berlin Philharmonic. Verdi's Messa da Requiem was on the program .

Recent highlights have included performances of Requiem settings by Mozart, Dvořák, Brahms and Verdi with chief conductor Mariss Jansons as well as appearances with guest conductors such as Claudio Abbado , Daniel Harding , Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Thomas Hengelbrock , Ton Koopman , Riccardo Muti and Simon Rattle .

The collaboration between the choir and original sound ensembles such as the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin or Concerto Köln is very popular . Increasingly, works are being performed and recorded that Bayerischer Rundfunk publishes as CDs and DVDs under its newly founded CD label. In 2013, for example, Bach's St. Matthew Passion as a CD / DVD and TV production under the direction of Peter Dijkstra with the Concerto Köln and the BR-Rundfunkchor. In 2016 Howard Arman took over the post of Artistic Director of the Radio Choir.

In addition to its concert activities, the radio choir is regularly involved in cultural events: For example, on June 19, 2011, on the occasion of the Music Day , on which BR 2011 brought the "cOHRworm" project into being for the first time. Around 1,500 amateur singers, the Bavarian Radio Choir, the State Youth Choir and the Munich Radio Orchestra performed together in the Cirkus Krone under the direction of Peter Dijkstra .

The program includes workshops and sing-along concert projects with schoolchildren and students that take place once a year. In addition, a choral conducting forum was established. The aim of the project is:

  1. Artistic advancement of the participants
  2. Gaining experience working with a professional choir
  3. Getting to know conductors who are already employed,
  4. Exploring professional opportunities in contact with the professionals

The BR presents a current selection of current recordings on CD and DVD with the Bavarian Radio Choir in the choir discography on its homepage.

Artistic director

Awards

CD productions

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. Jump up ↑ BR choir: the choir is cast. Bayerischer Rundfunk, accessed on April 27, 2016 .
  2. Mariss Jansons in BR.de, accessed on December 14, 2014 ( Memento from October 2, 2013 in the Internet Archive )
  3. ^ Karl Schumann, Renate Ulm, Andreas Mangold and others: 1949 - 1999 - 50 years of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra . Ed .: Renate Ulm for Bayerischer Rundfunk. Bärenreiter-Verlag, Kassel 1999, ISBN 3-7618-1395-3 , p. 231 .
  4. ^ Karl Schumann, Renate Ulm, Andreas Mangold and others: 1949 - 1999/50 years of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra . Ed .: Renate Ulm for Bayerischer Rundfunk. Bärenreiter-Verlag, Kassel 1999, ISBN 3-7618-1395-3 , p. 23-24 .
  5. ^ Karl Schumann, Renate Ulm, Andreas Mangold and others: 1949 - 1999/50 years of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra . Ed .: Renate Ulm for Bayerischer Rundfunk. Bärenreiter-Verlag, Kassel 1999, ISBN 3-7618-1395-3 , p. 29 .
  6. ^ Karl Schumann, Renate Ulm, Andreas Mangold and others: 1949–1999 - 50 Years of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra . Ed .: Renate Ulm for Bayerischer Rundfunk. Bärenreiter-Verlag, Kassel 1999, ISBN 3-7618-1395-3 , p. 232-234 .
  7. History of the Choir, 1946–1960: The Jochum Years. Bayerischer Rundfunk, accessed on April 7, 2016 .
  8. ^ Karl Schumann, Renate Ulm, Andreas Mangold and others: 1949–1999 - 50 Years of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra . Ed .: Renate Ulm for Bayerischer Rundfunk. Bärenreiter-Verlag, Kassel 1999, ISBN 3-7618-1395-3 , p. 29 .
  9. History of the Choir, 1983–1992: Sir Colin Davis. Bayerischer Rundfunk, accessed on April 7, 2016 .
  10. History of the Choir, 1993–2002: Hochglanzsound with Lorin Maazel. Bayerischer Rundfunk, accessed April 8, 2016 .
  11. ^ Portrait of Peter Dijkstra in BR.de, accessed on December 14, 2014.
  12. History of the Choir, 2003–2016: Mariss Jansons - Peter Dijkstra. Bayerischer Rundfunk, accessed April 8, 2016 .
  13. CDs and DVDs with the BR choir. Bayerischer Rundfunk, accessed on April 27, 2016 .
  14. ^ BR Choir: Awards and Prizes. (No longer available online.) Bayerischer Rundfunk, archived from the original on April 27, 2016 ; Retrieved April 27, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.br-chor.de