Basel Boys Choir
The Basel Boys Choir is a boys' choir based in Basel, Switzerland; it grew out of the boys' choir of the Protestant Church of Basel-City, founded by Hermann Ulbrich in 1927. Today the choir is non-denominational. They sing both sacred and secular works. The choir has been under the leadership of Oliver Rudin since 2017.
In addition, the choir has been invited to participate in important music festivals, including the Lucerne Festival under James Conlon, Mario Venzago, Riccardo Chailly and Mariss Jansons, the European Music Festival in Berlin under Roland Bader, the International Festival of Boys Choirs in Poznań, as well as festivals in Nancy, Maastricht, Venice, Basel, and the Schubert Choir Festival in Vienna in 1997. The Basel Boys Choir is also the host choir of the well-known and highly successful European Festival of Youth Choirs.
Structure
The choir consists of approximately 45 unchanged and 35 changed voices. The changed voices are, as a rule, former trebles and altos who have been in the choir for at least a year. The singers dedicate a considerable amount of their free time to the choir: in addition to rehearsals, there are church services, concerts, concert tours, radio and television appearances as well as CD recordings. A choir camp takes place each year for the purpose of learning repertoire.Awards
- CIMCF 2022 : 1. Place, 93/100 Points, Youth Choral Competition
- CIMCF 2022 : Winner "Most Entertaining Performance"
Repertoire
History
Founding and first year
The founding of the choir goes back to the initiative of the then-school teacher Hermann Ulbrich, who sang in the Basel Bach Choir and attended the Thomanerchor's many concerts under Karl Straube in Basel. Ulbrich turned to Ernst Lipp, a fellow singer in the Bach Choir and president of the Kommission für den Unterricht in der Biblischen Geschichte, and suggested that he found a singing school for the preservation of choral tradition that was in the service of the church, but independent of the YMCA. Lipp passed the idea on to the consistory, where it found little support. Nevertheless, the KUBG approved the charter, which Ulbrich had previously written together with Lipp and YMCA youth secretary Jakob Staehelin, and he took responsibility for the still-to-be-founded choir.At the beginning of June, 1927, Ulbrich sent out advertising for the Choirboys of the Protestant Church of Basel-City, institutionalized in May. On June 15, 1927, the first informational meeting took place with 33 interested boys; this date is taken to be the KKB's founding date. The first rehearsal took place on August 19, 1927 in the Bishop's residence of the Basel Münster; soon, though, they moved due to the heating problems in the Katharine Chapel of the cloister. The first public appearance occurred on October 30, 1927, as a part of a church service in the Martinskirche, but it was such a fiasco that Ulbrich threatened to resign. Lipp encouraged him to continue, however, and on Christmas, 1927, the choir enthralled the congregation of a church service in the Theodorskirche.
Their third appearance, a Bach concert in April 1928, was also their last before a long summer break, during which a large advertising campaign was carried out to ensure the continued existence of the group. Adolf Hamm, an organist at the Münster, played an important role in the campaign; he ensured that after the successful campaign, the choir, which had grown to 63 boys, was able to perform the Christmas Oratorio for Christmas, 1928, and a Passion concert for Easter, 1929. In August, 1929, a working party was founded on the occasion of the first parents' evening, and Jakob Staehelin was elected its first president, making him also the first president of the KKB.
In August, 1929, the Chorschüler der evangelisch-reformierten Kirche Basel-Stadt, which consisted of former choirboys whose voices had changed, was founded. The expansion of the choir to include changed voices had already been considered by January 1928, but the proposal did not resonate with the older students; the consistory also refused it because of the unintentional competition it would create with the adult community and church choirs. Nevertheless, the choir students appeared at Hamm's Free Organ Recital in December, 1928, but the group was ultimately unable to survive.
On December 22, 1929, the boys' choir organized their first full concert: a Christmas liturgy at the Münster with the locally renowned soprano Helene Sandreuter, which was a big success.
The quality of the singing, which was still modest in comparison with large boarding school choirs, was such a cause for concern among the choir parents that, after a weak appearance in a church service in Kleinhüningen, they demanded that the choir refrain from further public appearances for the time being. For that reason, the rehearsal time was extended from 75 to 120 minutes and divided into 60 minutes each of singing technique and choir rehearsal after the summer break in 1930. Meanwhile, the choir had grown to 88 boys, which necessitated changing the rehearsal space from St. John's Chapel to a larger and considerably more expensive location in Nadelberg by the Peterskirche. In December, 1930, the choir celebrated its 25th appearance. Their quality and proficiency had gradually increased, and soloists were already emerging from the choir.
In 1931, Ulbrich introduced a hierarchical group system inspired by the Scouts; following the Meistersinger model, singers could advance from Schüler to Sänger, and finally Meister. Additional elements, such as patches and a Sängerspiegel were incorporated. How long this hierarchical group system survived is unknown. However, everyone participated in all of the public appearances. The idea of a choir camp, which originated in 1930, was re-adopted by president Staehelin in 1932, and a camp was held from October 3–13 in Greifensee that year. The fifth anniversary, which occurred in 1932, was celebrated with a large family night with a lottery and singing.
One problem that came up again and again between 1930 and 1933 was the variation in the number of singers and the quality of the choir: Ulbrich was able to keep some of the members of the choir from leaving and train them for some promising performances, but the best singers quickly fell victim to their voices changing and had to leave; meanwhile, Ulbrich needed to recruit and train new boys. Furthermore, Schola Cantorum Basiliensis planned to form a children's choir, which meant further competition. For this reason, an "educational department" was created to avoid any further reduction in quality. Talented singers then still came into the choir right away, and the others went through the educational department. A further improvement came in 1933 with vocal training, for which they were able to employ Helene Sandreuter. The rehearsal space was changed from the expensive location in Nadelberg to the church. At the end of the year, Jakob Staehelin stepped down as president due to having to move from Basel; his cousin Hans Staehelin took over his position.
The years leading up to the Second World War were marked by solid efforts for improvement. Ulbrich and Sandreuter, the voice teacher, fell in love and were married on July 11, 1936. Also in 1936, Alfred Courvoisier assumed the presidency. In December, 1938, the choir undertook a half-hour radio program for the first time. The high point of the year, however, had already taken place on May 12, 1938: their participation in the premiere of Arthur Honegger's Jeanne d'Arc au Bûcher at Theater Basel with Ida Rubinstein as Jeanne and the chamber orchestra Basler Kammerorchester under the direction of Paul Sacher. A repeat performance with the boys' choir took place at the Swiss national exposition in Zürich in 1939.
Crisis during the Second World War
After the outbreak of World War II, rehearing became increasingly more difficult, and in 1940 the rehearsal space changed yet again, first to the City of Basel Music Academy, then to the kindergarten at the Basel Mission. Since Ulbrich had to serve in the military until July, 1940, Emil Herrmann and Helene Sandreuter were entrusted with the interim direction of the choir, leading to temporary cessation of voice lessons. Meanwhile, the size of the choir had shrunk by 25 percent. Ulbrich, who was still on duty, developed a Christmas liturgy with the choir. In 1941, a joint performance with the Schola Cantorum took place. Ernst Lipp, who had been intimately involved with the development of the choir since its founding, died that same year. In 1942 and 1943, interest in joining the choir fell dramatically from its generally high levels, and the choir had only 16 members in May, 1943, who were not of a high enough quality to give a successful concert with the Schola Cantorum at the Barfüsserkirche. Fortunately, by 1944 the choir had grown back to 30 members. In May, 1945, the choir organized a thanksgiving service on the occasion of the end of the war.Expansion and Ulbrich's last year
In the years after the war, the number of singers gradually increased. Ulbrich and Sandreuter, now married, could once again fully dedicate themselves to the choirboys. In 1945, the choir was already ready to perform for the premiere of Unser Vater by Walter Müller von Kulm with the Bach Choir. In 1949, the choir participated in the 17th "church music day," organized by the Swiss League of Church Music. In 1950, the minister Alfred Studer replaced Courvoisier as president. That same year, the choir returned to their original rehearsal space, the Bishop's residence, where the KKB still rehearses to this day.On June 22, 1952, the choir celebrated its 25-year anniversary with a special church service in Münster. The composer Rudolf Moser composed a setting of the 29th psalm for the choir. Changed voices, drawn from former trebles and altos, were brought into the choir. The enrollment of new singers was expanded to include students from the second grade and older, allowing them to compete strongly with the Scouts. In 1956, there was another change of president; Studer stepped down because he had to move and handed the position over to the composer Rudolf Moser. In 1959, after the success of a concert with organist Hans Balmer, the choir performed several contemporary works for Swiss radio.
In 1958, the changed voices were finally allowed to join the unchanged voices; the KUBG approved a trial period for their inclusion. A name change was also discussed, but put off until after the trial period. On August 23, 1958, the first rehearsal with eight changed voices took place, and Ulbrich announced in January, 1959, that their inclusion would be made permanent. However, since no tenors could be found until 1962, the deepest boys' voices and the voices still in the process of changing were used to sing the tenor parts. In 1959, the previously discussed name change finally took place: the choir became the Evangelische Kantorei Basel and became directly controlled by the consistory.
In 1960, the choir was shaken by President Moser's accidental death; his successor was Rudolf Massini. In the 1960s, Ulbrich handed over some of his responsibilities: his wife, Helene Sandreuter, and his son, Markus Ulbrich, along with Kurt Tschirren, an employee in the administration, assisted him in leading the choir, and Markus Ulbrich and Tschirren Kurse worked in the educational department.
In 1967 the "mutant group," a group of singers undergoing a voice change, was formed with the purpose of productively using the mandatory time off from the choir for vocal training and learning repertoire to better prepare themselves for vocal maturity. Beginning in 1967, the choir started advertising for all elementary school grades. In 1968, the older singers demanded the representation in a working committee, which they were finally granted.