Male choir Liederkranz Dornach

Male choir Liederkranz Dornach
Seat:	Dornach
Founding:	1876
Genus:	Male choir
Head :	Felix Looby
Voices :	30 ( TTBB )
Website :	http://www.maennerchor-dornach.ch/

The male choir Liederkranz Dornach is a Swiss male choir from Dornach . It was founded in 1876 and in the 1970s was one of the largest and most important choirs in Switzerland with around 120 singers.

history

The first choral society was formed in Dornach around 1830 and took part in the first cantonal choral festival in Olten in 1851 . In 1859 the third cantonal singing festival was held in Dornach under the leadership of this male choir, but for unknown reasons it broke up again in the early 1870s.

On June 2, 1876, the formal founding of the Liederkranz Choral Society was decided and celebrated a month later with a founding party. The bookbinder Theodor Studer was elected as the first president, the first conductor became the lawyer and court president Wilhelm Altermatt. The first 30 years were marked by numerous participation in regional song festivals ; There was a close collaboration with the Dornach Mixed Choir, which no longer exists between 1881 and 1889, but this was given up again. In 1907 the male choir carried out the Solothurn Cantonal Singing Festival.

In the years of the First World War , no festival attendance is recorded, instead there were entertainment concerts in Dornach and Arlesheim and the first friendly connections with the Arlesheim men's choir . In 1920 he participated in the Basel Cantonal Song Festival and in 1922 the first major concert with the Dornach Orchestra Association . On May 4, 1924, the choir sang an anniversary concert on the 425th anniversary of the Battle of Dornach. In May 1926, the Dornach men's choir celebrated its 50th anniversary with a gala concert in front of 200 visitors with the renewed participation of the Dornach Orchestra Association. The choir now consisted of around 60 singers.

Despite the time of crisis, the choir held the 17th Solothurn Cantonal Singing Festival in July 1936, thanks to strong support from the municipal administration. During the Second World War , activities again decreased significantly due to months of rehearsals being interrupted, but were increasingly resumed in 1949 at the latest with the 450th anniversary of the Battle of Dornach. In 1951, on the District Singers' Day in Dornach, the 75th anniversary of the Dornach Male Choir was celebrated with an anniversary concert with works by the composer Hans Huber from the region .

After the anniversary concert, Bruno Straumann resigned as conductor; Alois Gschwind was elected as his successor at an extraordinary general meeting. Under Gschwind, the choir developed into a nationally important music association in the years that followed. In 1958 the choir won a gold laurel wreath for the first time at the 9th Central Switzerland Singing Festival in Zug with the work "Bergland" by Paul Schaller . In 1963 the oratorio “ The Seasons ” by Joseph Haydn was successfully performed several times, followed in 1967 by the “ Messiah ” by Georg Friedrich Händel . In 1964 the choir represented the canton of Solothurn at the national exhibition in Lausanne. Another cantonal song festival took place in Dornach in 1968 with around 3400 participants. In November 1970 Haydn's “ Creation ” was performed twice, for the first time in the Great Hall of the Goetheanum . In 1969 singers traveled to Genoa , Sanremo and Nice . In March 1974 the choir sang again Haydn's “The Seasons” in the Goetheanum, with Kurt Widmer as bass soloist and with Federal Councilor Willi Ritschard and the entire Solothurn cantonal government in the audience. At the 100th anniversary celebration in September 1976, the number of active participants had meanwhile been well over 100.

In November 1978, Joseph Haydn's “Creation” was performed again in the Goetheanum. The previous high point in the club's history took place in 1981: for the 500th anniversary of the canton of Solothurn in the Swiss Confederation, the Dornach men's choir performed the oratorio “ Elias ” by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy together with the Cäcilienchor and the Basel Symphony Orchestra . In 1982 a Christmas concert with the " Deutsche Messe " by Michael Haydn was given in the Dornach monastery . In November 1986 Alois Gschwind resigned as a conductor after 35 years; he said goodbye with a large orchestral concert with the " Te Deum " by Marc-Antoine Charpentier and the " Timpani Mass " by Joseph Haydn. Gschwind's successor was Bruno Stöckli .

Stöckli's first appearances were in autumn 1987 on the 43rd District Singers' Day in Dornach and the " Deutsche Messe " by Franz Schubert in the monastery. However, Stöckli resigned after two years and was replaced by Rudolf Dörfler. The nationwide shrinking of singers also found its way into the Dornach male choir; However, many also withdrew after Gschwind's resignation and the many changes in conductor, which meant that the choir could no longer build on the great successes of the past and concentrate on its annual activities. In 1994 there was a guest appearance on the DRS television program "Bsuech in ..." under the conductor Gerhard Graf, who, however, also resigned in 1996 after only two years.

With Simon Reich, a young conductor was able to successfully lead the choir up to its 125th anniversary; the anniversary concert was able to tie in with the major concerts under Gschwind for the first time with Schubert's “ Festgesang ”, the “ Normannenzug ” by Max Bruch and the “ Land Recognition ” by Edvard Grieg . Reich, who resigned after the anniversary, could not stop the further decline in membership to around 30 active singers. Andreas Meier (until 2005), Tobias Wicky (until 2008), David Rossel (until 2012), Tobias Stückelberger (until 2014) and Felix Looby (currently) have been musical directors of the Knabenkantorei Basel since 2002.

literature

• Alfred Wiesler et al. (Ed.): Festschrift Men's Choir Liederkranz Dornach. 125 years of joy in singing , Dornach, 2001.