Gächinger Kantorei
Choir
Founded1954 (1954)
FounderHelmuth Rilling
GenreMixed concert choir
Members200
Chief conductor
HeadquartersStuttgart
AffiliationInternationale Bachakademie Stuttgart
Websitewww.bachakademie.de/de/gaechinger.html

Gächinger Kantorei (Gächingen Chorale) is an internationally known German mixed choir, founded by Helmuth Rilling in 1954 in Gächingen (part of St. Johann close to Reutlingen) and conducted by him until 2013, succeeded by Hans-Christoph Rademann.

A "Kantorei" is a choir of high standard dedicated mostly, but not exclusively, to sacred music. The ensemble operates in Stuttgart now and is therefore officially named Gächinger Kantorei Stuttgart. The choir has up to 200 voices, called together for projects from Germany and Switzerland, most of them singers with a degree in music. Since 1965 they have performed music with orchestra as Gächinger Kantorei and Bach-Collegium Stuttgart, including several first performances.

History

Initially the choir was dedicated to a cappella music of the 16th, 17th and 20th century, later adding works from the period of Romanticism.[1] In 1965 Rilling founded the orchestra Bach-Collegium Stuttgart, and both groups started performing choral music with orchestra.[2]

The first international tours were conducted in the 1960s to the (then) DDR, CSSR and Hungary, the first tour to the United States followed in 1968. In 1976 the choir sang with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra the first performance in Israel of Brahms's A German Requiem.[3] Tours of the 1980s took the group to Poland and Moscow.

Gächinger Kantorei and Bach-Collegium Stuttgart have performed at festivals such as the "Musikfest Stuttgart" of the Internationale Bachakademie Stuttgart, Salzburg Festival, Lucerne Festival or the Prague Spring. In 2004 they celebrated their 50th year by performing Bach's Mass in B minor at the Oregon Bach Festival.[4] They have appeared at the Rheingau Musik Festival and recorded Mozart's Great Mass in C Minor in 2006.[5]

Music

During the first years the Gächinger Kantorei performed a cappella works of Buxtehude, Schütz, Pachelbel, Lasso, Hassler, Bach, Caspar Othmayr and Leonhard Lechner, and music of 20th century composers such as Hugo Distler, Paul Hindemith, Kurt Hessenberg, Willy Burkhard, including premieres of works by Johann Nepomuk David, Evangelienmotetten (motets on the Gospel) in 1959 and Psalm 139 in 1961.[6]

Gächinger Kantorei and Bach-Collegium Stuttgart, conducted by Rilling, completed the first complete recording of Bach's cantatas and oratorios, a project of 15 years in collaboration with the Hänssler Verlag, on 21 March 1985, the composer's 300th birthday.[7][8] The recording was awarded a Grand Prix du Disque.

The choir premiered works such as the Messa per Rossini (1988), Litany of Arvo Pärt (1994), the Requiem of Reconciliation (1995)[9] or Wolfgang Rihm's Deus Passus (Passionsstücke nach Lukas) in 2000[10] and Creatio in 2009. They explored different repertoire in 2004, in a premiere performance and recording of Mendelsohn's opera Die beiden Neffen.

Gächinger Kantorei have also performed new versions of works, such as Mozart's unfinished Great Mass in C minor completed by Robert D. Levin. In 2009 they performed Bach's Christmas Oratorio in St. Thomas Church, Leipzig where it had been premiered 275 years before.[11]

The choir has performed with notable guest conductors such as Masaaki Suzuki. Krzysztof Penderecki conducted his Credo on the occasion of Rilling's 70th birthday, 29 May 2003, with the Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart, programmed with Bach's setting of these words in the Symbolum Nicenum from his Mass in B minor, Rilling conducting Gächinger Kantorei and Bach-Collegium Stuttgart with Sibylla Rubens, Ingeborg Danz and Christian Gerhaher.[12] Sir Roger Norrington chose the choir for his recording of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 with Camilla Nylund, Iris Vermillion, Jonas Kaufmann, Franz-Josef Selig and the Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart.[13] Ton Koopman conducted Haydn's The Seasons with soloists Klara Ek, Jörg Dürmüller and Klaus Mertens in 2009.[14]

In 2009 the Gächinger Kantorei sang under Rilling with the New York Philharmonic Handel's Messiah in Avery Fisher Hall in New York with soloists Annette Dasch, Daniel Taylor, James Taylor and Shenyang.[15][16]

Literature

  • Andreas Bomba (ed.): „Singet se noh...?“ (50 years Gächinger Kantorei 1954–2004). Internationale Bachakademie, Stuttgart 2004

References

  1. ↑ Gächinger Kantorei State Capital Stuttgart (in German)
  2. ↑ Bach-Collegium Stuttgart Archived 2012-02-26 at the Wayback Machine State Capital Stuttgart (in German)
  3. ↑ Rede von Botschafter Shimon Stein Ambassador Shimon Stein on the occasion of awarding the Otto-Hirsch-Gedenkmedaille to Helmuth Rilling, 16 February 2004 (in German)
  4. ↑ 38 voices, 50 years: The choir Helmuth Rilling has led for half a century makes its first trip to the Oregon Bach Festival Archived 2010-11-28 at the Wayback Machine by Fred Crafts of The Register-Guard, 4 July 2004
  5. ↑ Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Messe c-Moll Archived 2010-08-08 at the Wayback Machine Rheingau Musik Festival CDs und DVD]
  6. ↑ vita - fotos Archived 2010-11-24 at the Wayback Machine Helmuth Rilling, until 1959, s. 1954 (in German)
  7. ↑ Helmuth Rilling Archived 2011-05-05 at the Wayback Machine on classics.online
  8. ↑ Helmuth Rilling on allmusic
  9. ↑ Colorado Choir performs 'Requiem for Reconciliation' Archived 2011-06-12 at the Wayback Machine Denver Catholic Register, 2001, reference to the commission and first performance
  10. ↑ Deus Passus, review of the recording, by Daniel Felsenfeld
  11. ↑ 275 Jahre Weihnachtsoratorium: Gächinger Kantorei und Bach-Collegium Stuttgart in der Thomaskirche in Leipziger Internet Zeitung, 27 November 2009 (in German)
  12. ↑ Benefizkonzert zum 70. Geburtstag von Helmuth Rilling Archived 2003-08-10 at archive.today
  13. ↑ Beethoven Symphony No. 9 review by David Hurwitz, 2003
  14. ↑ Haydn Jahreszeiten Archived 2009-08-11 at the Wayback Machine pictured (in German)
  15. ↑ Messiah Archived 2010-03-06 at the Wayback Machine New York Philharmonic, 2009
  16. ↑ A Period-Style Taste of a Holiday-Season Staple review by Vivian Schweitzer in The New York Times, 16 December 2009

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