Bavarian Radio Choir

Founded in 1946, the Bavarian Radio Choir has been performing the great choral symphonic literature and oratorios from the Baroque to the present for more than 75 years. While its most important partner is the Ba-
varian Radio Symphony Orchestra, it has also given joint concerts with the Berlin and Vienna Philharmonic Orchestras, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, and the Sächsische Staatskapelle. Mariss Jansons, who held the reins as Principal Conductor from 2003 until his death in 2019, led numerous memorable performances; his successor, Sir Simon Rattle, starts in the 2023-24 season. The singers present their own subscription cycle in Munich, drawing on a wide-ranging repertoire that extends from medieval motets to the present day; they also make music with such historically informed ensembles as Il Giardino Armonico and the Berlin Academy for Early Music. The choir has a reputation for the world premieres it has given as part of the series “musica viva” and “Paradisi gloria”; meanwhile, the “cOHRwürmer” series of sing-along concerts are aimed at a broad audience. Guest appearances have taken the Bavarian Radio Choir to Japan, the Salzburg Festival, the Mozart Festival in Würzburg, the Rheingau Music Festival, and the Beethoven Festival in Bonn. The ensemble has received many awards for its recordings, most recently the Diapason d’or in 2019 for Rachmaninoff’s The Bells. The Dutch conductor Peter Dijkstra, who previously held the position from 2005 to 2016, has been serving as Choral Director since 2022 and is also responsible for rehearsing the women’s chorus for Mahler’s Third Symphony.

Lucerne Festival (IMF) debut on 30 August 1965 in Janáček’s From the House of the Dead under the direction of Rafael Kubelík.

July 2023