Vienna Boys Choir

VIENNA BOYS CHOIR

Formed: 1498, Vienna, Austria

Genre: Classical

Formed on the order of Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I in 1498 to sing at his court, the Vienna Boys Choir (Wiener Sängerknaben) is one of the world's oldest performing arts institutions. The choir's rigorous training, clear sound, and technical prowess are renowned, and through its annual international tours, the Vienna Boys have become cultural ambassadors for Austria.

The choir has a long and colorful history stretching back more than five hundred years. It has produced numerous first-class vocalists, violinists, and pianists who helped shape Vienna as one of Europe's musical capitals. Joseph Haydn sang with the court choir in the eighteenth century, Franz Schubert wrote some of his first compositions for the choir in the nineteenth century, and numerous composers, including Senfl, Fux, Salieri, Haydn, and Bruckner, wrote music for it.

When the Habsburg dynasty collapsed in 1918 at the end of World War I—and with it most court institutions—it looked like the choir might disappear. But it was refounded in 1924 by Joseph Schnitt, who believed that the boarding school method of training choristers was the only way to keep alive the famous Viennese musical tradition.

Until the 1920s the choir had performed only at the court. Its refounding marks the beginning of the choir's modern history of touring and a system of musical education that brought it to the attention of the world. By the end of the 1930s the choir had performed all over the world. Since 1932 it has made more than fifty tours of America.

The Vienna Boys Choir is actually a group of more than 100 members between the ages of ten and fourteen, divided up into choirs of 24 members each. Two choirs make annual tours, presenting some 300 annual performances for more than 500,000 fans. Tours generally last about three months each. The other two choirs stay in Vienna studying. Members live in the historic Augarten Palace, studying academic subjects in the morning and music in the afternoon.

The Vienna Boys Choir has made dozens of recordings, cutting across numerous styles and genres of classical and popular music. The group has worked and recorded with some of the twentieth century's best conductors, including Leonard Bernstein, Herbert von Karajan, and Sir George Solti. It has performed for world leaders, and appeared frequently on television. The choir has also contributed to a number of film soundtracks, including Primal Fear (1996) and The 13th Floor (1999). Despite all its international activity, the choir still sings weekly mass at Vienna's Hofburg Chapel, as it has done since 1498.

By the early 1990s the Vienna Boys Choir had become something of a "tourist trap," performing more than it should to earn money for its operations. Musical standards and training had slipped since the 1970s, its training methods were out-of-date, and the choir had lost its recording contract.

But the choir took steps to revitalize itself, modernizing its curriculum, cutting down on the number of performances, and expanding its repertoire. It has embarked on multimedia projects, found new collaborators, and participated in the creation of children's operas, and has worked to update its image for the twenty-first century.

SELECTIVE DISCOGRAPHY:

The Best of the Vienna Boys Choir (Delta, 2000).

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

F. Endler, Vienna Choir Boys (Vienna, 1987); K. Lorenz, A History of the Vienna Boys's Choir (Sussex, England, 1998).

WEBSITE:

www.wsk.at/english/main.asp.

douglas mclennan