Collegium Musicum of the RWTH Aachen
| Collegium Musicum of the RWTH Aachen | |
|---|---|
| Seat: | Aachen |
| Carrier: | RWTH Aachen |
| Founding: | 1952 |
| Genus: | Choir and orchestra |
| Head : | Tobias Haussig |
| Website : | www.cm.rwth-aachen.de |
The Collegium Musicum of RWTH Aachen was founded in the winter semester of 1952/1953 on the initiative of students, assistants and professors of RWTH Aachen, initially in the form of a chamber orchestra , which was later expanded to include a choir. In addition to the Aachen Student Orchestra (ASO), the Aachen University Salon Orchestra (ACHSO) and the Junge Symphonieorchester e. V. (JSO) one of four orchestras for students in Aachen. The Collegium Musicum has been under the direction of Raimund Laufen since the summer semester 2017. Thomas Gries is the academic director .
Organization and structure
The Collegium Musicum initially started under its first director Rudolf Bremen as a pure classical orchestra with different line-ups. A choir was added as early as 1958 . In 1989 Fritz ter Wey , who had already founded the Young Choir Aachen in 1966 , took over the orchestra and expanded it to a symphonic line-up. After ter Weys was appointed professor at the Detmold University of Music , the Dutchman Hubert Pittie , who was strongly influenced by Sergiu Celibidache , was hired as the new director. It is mainly thanks to him that we have contacts with the various Dutch ensembles.
The wide-ranging repertoire includes works from the baroque to the modern , but also sacred cantatas and large masses such as B. Verdi's Requiem . In addition, the Collegium Musicum made some German premieres such as B. from Béla Bartók's attention. For several semesters, the program has been expanded to include chamber music works . Numerous concert evenings spread over the year as well as regular appearances as part of the Musik & Motion series of the RWTHextern Citizens' Forum are part of the orchestra's compulsory program. Thanks to its convincing achievements, the Collegium Musicum was able to perform in neighboring Germany and abroad as well as in joint arrangements, for example with the Maastricht University Choir , with the Luxembourg ensemble Les Musiciens, with the renowned Krashna Musica orchestra of the TU Delft and with the Aachen department of the University of Music Cologne and the Aachen Symphony Orchestra .
On the occasion of its 50th anniversary in 2002, the CM was presented and honored in a special way in the Deutschlandfunk broadcasting campus and career .
In the 2015 summer semester, there was a change of conductor for the first time in more than 20 years and Ernst von Marschall from Düsseldorf was now in charge of the choir and orchestra. He realized projects such as an orchestra exchange with the Czech Technical University in Prague and the choir performance of the St. Matthew Passion (JS Bach) . After four semesters, Raimund Laufen finally took over the direction of the choir and orchestra. He made his debut with A German Requiem by Johannes Brahms . Laufen resigned from his position as conductor of the Collegium Musicum in the winter semester 2019/2020 after the performance of Carl Orff's Carmina Burana . From now on, Tobias Haussig leads the choir and orchestra as the new university music director.