Youth choir movement

The youth choir movement was a decade-long development of Christian music , especially the New Spiritual Song in German-speaking countries, which spread in the late 1960s among especially the free church evangelical youth and was carried by them until the mid-1990s.

History and Development

In 1968 the mission organization Jugend für Christus entrusted the leadership of its established Youth for Christ choir to the young musician Klaus Heizmann . The first full-time musician of the missionary organization had previously spent an additional year of study in the USA at the request of the director after completing his music studies , in order to get to know the contemporary Christian music there. Under its new conductor, the Youth for Christ Choir played the new sacred songs, which were mostly translated into German. The modern arrangements with prominent brass players, guitars and later also drums represented a daring pioneering achievement in the extremely conservative German Christian music scene at the end of the 1960s and were often viewed with disapproval. The Christian, mostly free church, youth throughout Germany, however, took up modern sacred music with enthusiasm, organized themselves into youth choirs and integrated the new songs into the services. The wave of imitation demanded the song material in printed form, so that Klaus Heizmann began to bring out the individual singles of the Youth for Christ Choir in sheet music series. The New Spiritual Song developed from the American model and was shaped by German lyricists and composers such as Manfred Siebald , Peter Strauch , Margret Birkenfeld , Johannes Nitsch and Gerhard Schnitter . The songs were spread and made known by newly formed formations such as the Wetzlar Youth Choir around Margret Birkenfeld, but also by previously established choirs - which are now often at least partially integrated into the youth choir movement - such as the We-sing-for-Jesus choir . According to internal information, there were around 200 choirs across Germany in 1978 and a total of around 3,000 singers.

The American evangelist Billy Graham set a clear signal for the new sacred music in 1970 with his first major evangelism, Euro 70, which was broadcast throughout Europe when he gave the music program to Klaus Heizmann. A year earlier he had already been invited by the world association of his mission organization Youth for Christ International with a selected choir as The Deutschland Singers on a concert tour through the USA. The Euro Choir continued to strive for this success .

Parallel, and barely distinguish partly developed in addition to in their own self-image as worship suitable positioned youth choir movement in the earliest 1970s, the Contemporary Christian music with the introduction of Siegfried Fietz in the book and record publishing Hermann Schulte , today Gerth media . In the beginning, the two currents worked closely together for the common goal of updating Christian music in Germany, and in this way benefited and complemented each other. This is how the first albums of the Wetzlar Youth Choir were created in collaboration with the rock group Eden , and in the mid-1970s Hella Heizmann's seamless emancipation from the youth choir movement into pop music became possible and for the same reason solo artists such as Manfred Siebald, Johannes Nitsch, Jan Vering and others always formed together again in choir groups like the Christ Singers or Aufwind .

In 1981 Klaus Heizmann founded the St. Goar Music Education Center (MBZ) after passing on the leadership of the Youth for Christ Choir to his long-time pianist Dietrich Georg , which served both as a training center for church musicians and musicians as well as organizer and Was the host of leisure time singing or the production location of new sound carriers with in-house studio choir.

In 1986, Jochen Rieger succeeded Margret Birkenfeld as head of the music department at Schulte & Gerth . With the Schulte & Gerth studio choir , he recorded the concept series Living Psalms , which stylistically can hardly be assigned to the New Spiritual Song. The youth choir movement has also mixed with gospel choirs. Due to a lack of positioning in the early 1990s, especially due to the over-presence of opulent complete works such as cantatas and oratorios but also experimental projects, for example international concepts around the current Israeli trend, which were rather useless for permanent community practice, the general awareness of the Youth choir movement lost. Finally, a solo artist - Werner Hoffmann - is the last new discovery of the trend . From the initial equality between him and the Schulte & Gerth studio choir, the choir soon faded into the background and finally became completely unnecessary. This can representatively be seen as the end of the youth choir movement - even if musicians of the scene like Jochen Rieger tried to revive the scene with projects that were now very practical, partly in cooperation with important associations like the Evangelical Singing Association .

Interpreters of the youth choir movement

Aufwind under the direction of Johannes Nitsch Christ singer under the direction of Reinhard Henkel The bridge builders under the direction of Klaus Heizmann and from 1983 Berthold Engel The water carriers under the direction of Heiner Zahn EC youth choir of the Association Decided for Christ under the direction of Helmut Hoeft Euro choir under the direction of Klaus Heizmann ERF studio choir of Evangeliums-Rundfunks under the direction of Gerhard Schnitter and later Annette Rautenberg Evangelium Choir Stuttgart under the direction of Friedrich Hänssler Jugendchor Aidlingen of Diakonissenmutterhaus house Aidlingen under the direction of Gerhard reaper Youth with a Mission Erndtebrück youth choir under the direction of Hartmut Birkelbach Youth for Christ choir under the direction of Klaus Heizmann and later Dietrich Georg Perspectives under the direction of Jochen Rieger

Prisma under the direction of Armin Müller Feedback under the direction of Klaus Heizmann and later Markus Lenzing Choir of the Evangelical Singers Association under the direction of Reinhold Weber Schulte & Gerth studio choir under the direction of Jochen Rieger Spectrum from the Christian Singers Association under the direction of Martin Falk Studio choir of the St. Goar Music Education Center under the direction of Klaus Heizmann Wetzlar youth choir under the direction of Margret Birkenfeld and later Jochen Rieger Wetzlar girls' choir as the forerunner of the youth choir, also under the direction of Margret Birkenfeld Wiesbaden studio choir under the direction of Klaus Heizmann We-sing-for-Jesus-Choir under the direction of Ernst August Eicker

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Archive link ( Memento of the original from October 4, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) 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.  
2. ↑ http://www.gerth.de/index.php?vp_id=googl-search&id=autor&substringFilterParticipants=967296
3. ↑ http://www.mch-musik.de/Daniel/EXAMENSARBEITInternet.pdf
4. ↑ Andreas Malessa : The new sound. Christian Pop Music - History and Stories. R. Brockhaus Verlag , Wuppertal 1980, ISBN 3-417-20297-3 , page 159.
5. ↑ http://www.bubmann.com/publikationen/Sound.htm ( Memento from July 31, 2012 in the web archive archive.today )
6. ↑ http://www.edenstory.de/Die_Story.html
7. ↑ http://www.sendbuch.de/n1230/werner_hoffmann