"Opera, that's what many people mean: Two fat people shouting at each other. And in the end, the woman dies," Mustafa Akça stated with a grin at the Freiburg symposium Opera finds the city. Community opera as an interface between contemporary music education and artjointly organized by the Freiburg Community Opera Association and the Young Ears Network. Akça is trying to open up the Komische Oper Berlin to new cultural circles. For several years, he has therefore regularly packed a number of musicians and singers into his opera dolmuş (in Turkey, shared cabs are called dolmuş - Turkish for "cab"). filled) and travels to other parts of the city to perform some scenes from current productions as a pop-up opera in a bar. "Subsidized opera must be there for all sections of the city's population." In the field of opera, the aristocratic structures dating back to the 19th century are particularly entrenched, the panel participants complained. At the Bern University of the Arts, Barbara Balba Weber therefore wants to awaken students' interest in other social groups as early as the training stage. In Fribourg too, as dramaturge Veit B. Arlt says, they want to "get out of the fortress of the municipal theater" and open up other spaces and a new audience.

Photo: Maurice Korbel

A moving streetcar is one such space. However, there is not only space inside for the stage and the premiere audience, but also from the outside, when people waiting at the stops catch a few seconds of the performance with astonished looks. Arlt's idea of turning the audience into tourists traveling through a recreated Breisgau adventure park in the year 2048 is brilliant. Unfortunately, the resulting theatrical tension is not played out any further in Thalia Kellmeyer's production; Freiburg passes by the window without comment. Instead, an amateur choir (conducted by Raffaella Dilles) plays opera-loving Freiburgers who dare to come out of hiding after a thirty-year ban on singing. Conductor Jan F. Kurth has written strongly rhythmic music for the piece, which is somewhat reminiscent of Kurt Weill. At the end, after 45 entertaining minutes, the streetcar turns back into the depot to be greeted by dancing people in the hall. What exactly the opera house of the future will be remains uncertain.

Lucerne's artistic director Benedikt von Peter is also looking for new premises. With the wooden box right next to the Theater he has installed a permanent outdoor performance venue to lower the audience's inhibitions. "There's a danger to life," a child with bunny ears (Fionn Berchtold) screeches through the megaphone. "Their future is at stake!" The audience is then individually and carefully prepared for the hour-long musical theater evening Children's death songs in the dark to his place in the box. A woman and a man (Sarah Alexandra Hudarew and Jason Cox) have turned their backs on each other. British sound artist Matthew Herbert imagines the everyday life of this couple with recorded sounds such as brushing teeth. Only after a ten-minute collage does Sarah Alexandra Hudarew begin Gustav Mahler's first song Now the sun wants to rise so brightlyaccompanied by twelve members of the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra (conductor: Clemens Heil), who are distributed around the room and constantly change places. However, the production fails to stir the audience. The pain is more asserted than felt.

The so-called slapstick opera In the Office for Death Affairs by Klaus von Heydenaber (director: Viktor Bodó) also deals with death - albeit in a rather comedic way. An opera (almost) without text, performed by the agile Lucerne 21st Century Orchestra (musical director: William Kelley) and a soloist ensemble made up of actors and singers. The evening on the main stage of the Lucerne Theater breathes the spirit of operetta and revue, especially as small choreographies are also incorporated. On the second floor is the clinically white Office of Death Affairs, where uniformly dressed and coiffed officials make coffee and fill out notepads (stage: Márton Ágh). Underneath is a filthy subway station, which remains empty for the time being to the grooving, neoclassical sounds from the orchestra pit. The lonely figures then move between the photo booth, hairdressing salon and toilet in a world of their own. Driven by the catchy music, a network of relationships is woven in which the actors find each other, sometimes more, sometimes less. However, there are no real areas of friction. And the slapstick scenes are also manageable. The character of Diana (Schnürpel), who develops from a Russian cleaning lady into a prima donna in a toilet paper dress (costumes: Fruzsina Nagy), is the most striking. The second part takes place in a morgue before the Office of Death Affairs presses the reset button, the music plays backwards and the characters have changed their costumes and thus their identities. Everything could now start all over again under different circumstances - but the opera breaks off at precisely the point that promises suspense.

Photo: Ingo Höhn

Scene from "Im Amt für Todesangelegenheiten" by Klaus von Heydenaber

For his completion of Mozart's reqiuem, Dutron studied Mozart's autograph in detail. His orchestration sets new color accents and the dramaturgy new contrasts without abandoning the tonal language of Mozart's time. This convinced René Jacobs, who recorded the version for the Harmonia Mundi label in 2017. Further performances are planned by Raphaël Pichon, among others.

Pierre-Henri Dutron is a composer, arranger, violinist and producer. He completed his studies in Basel and at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Paris. He has composed around ten stage works, including "Et les Hommes se tairont" (2011), "Cecilia da Roma" (2012) and "Les Cordes tendues" (2015). As a producer, he also works with pop and indie bands, for example he accompanied the reggae and hip-hop band Gentleman for MTV Unplugged. He is also active as a film musician and interpreter of classical music.

The score can be downloaded at www.pierrehenridutron.com/fullscore.html can be downloaded.

Addendum June 10, 2022: Unfortunately, this link no longer works - a current link could not be found online. (SMZ/ks)

On this September afternoon, visitors enter the Geneva Opera House through a barrier along a stony construction site path. Hard hats are handed out during the guided tour for the international press. The extensive renovation work will take almost three years before the renowned opera house reopens on February 12, 2019. Ring of the Nibelung will be reopened. From the coming season, Aviel Cahn from Zurich, who is currently still managing the Flemish Opera in Antwerp/Ghent with great success, will take over the management of the house from Artistic Director Tobias Richter.
The restorers have removed false ceilings, cleaned large-format frescoes and applied new paint. Even though not everything is finished yet, the result is already impressive. The paintings have become much more intense. A ticket booth and a bar have also been installed in the magnificent entrance hall to liven up the building during the day and open it up to the city. The atrium has changed considerably. Here, the original ceiling decorated with rich stucco has been uncovered. Instead of glass doors, modern, dark wooden doors now lead into the entrance hall. The neon tubes also provide an eye-catching feature in the historically decorative surroundings. Even a fire door is decorated with ornaments.

Anyone entering the second floor via the sweeping staircase will be overwhelmed by the richly decorated Grand Foyer. Heavy crystal chandeliers hang from the lavishly decorated ceilings by Geneva painter Léon Gaud. The two smaller rooms - the Foyer Rath and the Foyer Lyrique, which is reserved for sponsors and patrons - have also been renovated with great attention to detail. The backstage area, which cannot be seen during the tour, has also been modernized so that not only the visitors but also the artists should feel even more comfortable in the renovated building. The artists' dressing rooms, the workshops, the offices, the kitchen area - apart from the stage and the auditorium, everything has been brought up to the latest technical and aesthetic standards. In addition, two underground rehearsal rooms were created for the choir and ballet. Of the 75 million Swiss francs that the renovation cost, the City of Geneva covered 70 million. The remaining 5 million was financed by foundations.

During the reconstruction period, however, the people of Geneva did not have to miss out on opera performances. With the help of sponsorship money, a complete wooden opera house was erected next to the UN site, which met the highest acoustic standards. This Opéra des Nations was purchased from the Comédie-Française in Paris and transported to Geneva in 60 articulated lorries. At the Carmen-After the premiere, which opens the season, visitors enjoy an Aperol Spritz on the small forecourt on this September evening. The red carpet here is blue. Instead of stucco and frescoes, the functional building looks out onto sober wooden walls. People come here for the music - and it can be heard in the steeply rising auditorium. The overture played by the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande under the direction of John Fiore sounds bouncy and transparent. Director and choreographer Reinhild Hoffmann achieves the feat of turning the much-performed opera into a multifaceted, gripping drama with very few resources and excellent character direction. Sébastien Guèze as Don José sounds a little nasal at the beginning. The longer the evening lasts, the freer and more dramatic the French tenor's voice becomes. With Ekaterina Sergeeva, he has a Carmen in a class of her own at his side, who not only trumps vocally with her deep mezzo, but also has great charisma. Ildebrando D'Arcangelo is a virile Escamillo with charm and a dark timbre. With Rossini's Viva la Mamma (premiere on December 21), the people of Geneva will bid farewell to their wooden opera house.

Artistic Director Tobias Richter looks back with satisfaction on the two and a half seasons at the Opéra des Nations: "We were able to show a completely different artistic profile here - especially with the baroque operas. The move also enabled us to attract a new audience without losing the old one. That was a great challenge." After the move, the alternative venue will be dismantled again and transported to China - where a private production company has bought the portable opera house. And does the Artistic Director want to change anything in the new old house in the final months of his term of office in Geneva? "My intention is to bring the audience and the artistic team back to the Grand Théâtre de Genève safely and well. My successor would then be responsible for changes."

Following the purchase of Hall 53 by the city in summer 2015, the Office for Urban Development carried out a two-stage public tender. A team led by Beat Rothen Architektur GmbH (Winterthur) and "Denkstatt sàrl" (Basel) was selected. The team engaged former city architect Michael Hauser for the process design.

The concept envisages the installation of a multi-purpose hall with a capacity for around 1,200 people in the front building of the hall, which is intended for music concerts of all genres - for example, concerts by the Musikkollegium or pop concerts. However, other uses such as congresses, conferences and trade fairs are also possible. A bar is planned on the platform next to the hall, with a view of the imposing, three-aisled hall. In the hall itself, there will be a high-quality and varied offer with several small kitchens (food court).

Co-working spaces as well as course and seminar rooms are located on two platforms that are built lengthways into the hall. The ZHAW and Technopark, among others, are conceivable tenants for these rooms. Synergies with the adjacent event hall are also being considered. The open, flexible part of the hall can be used as a marketplace for a variety of temporary purposes. It will serve as an everyday meeting place, not least for the neighborhood. Events such as Afro-Pfingsten, Jungkunst etc. can continue to take place here.
 

This year's New Music Festival in Donaueschingen will focus on experimental music, technical experiments and new forms of presentation. Works by Isabel Mundry, Georges Aperghis, Benedict Mason, Francesco Filidei, Enno Poppe, Marco Stroppa and Agata Zubel, among others, will be premiered. Around 10,000 visitors are expected.

They were opened with an installation by Swiss artist Zimoun. He "transforms the space with mechanical sound exciters into rhythmically complex time structures." This year's Donaueschingen Music Days sound art program also presents works from Egypt, Bolivia, Morocco and Taiwan. The focus is on works that "establish a significant connection between the realities of life, culturally influenced ideas of sound and the materials used", including deliberately rough materials such as cardboard and wire, natural materials such as clay and stone.

According to the government announcement, the unbundling of responsibilities ensures that the existence of all institutions concerned can be guaranteed. The newly defined parameters form the basis for a "future-oriented and sustainable cultural partnership between the two cantons".

As in the previous cultural contract, the funds are earmarked for cultural center services and support for private or public museums is excluded. In future, the Canton of Basel-Landschaft will pay the compensation to the Canton of Basel-Stadt and no longer to individual institutions. The distribution of funds to the institutions will be carried out by the Canton of Basel-Stadt on the basis of objective criteria that will be set out in a contract.

Unbundling of responsibilities in institutional funding and strengthening of project-related partnership funding In terms of unbundling responsibilities, the Canton of Basel-Landschaft will assume significantly more responsibility for the Haus der elektronischen Künste (HeK), which is domiciled in Basel-Landschaft, from 2022 and will transfer its share of the operating contribution to the RFV Basel (pop promotion and music network of the Basel region), which provides funding on behalf of both cantons, to the regular cantonal budget. The promotion of the Basel Paper Mill, which has been supported by the cultural contract lump sum since 2017 as a transitional solution, will in future fall entirely under the responsibility of the Canton of Basel-Stadt.

In the area of partnership-based project and production funding, the two governments are sending "a visible signal for a strong funding partnership" by ensuring full parity in the funding of the bi-cantonal expert committees BS/BL from 2022. To this end, the canton of Basel-Landschaft is unilaterally increasing its contributions to full parity.

With these key figures for the future cultural partnership, the two governments are presenting a solution that ensures the continued existence of the 17 institutions supported by the current cultural contract (cultural contract lump sum). They are implementing a system change in the sense of unbundling responsibilities in institutional funding and strengthening project-oriented funding. The governments are convinced that the newly defined parameters form the basis for a future-oriented and sustainable cultural partnership.

The Government Council of the Canton of Basel-Landschaft is also striving to increase its commitment to cultural infrastructure and to strengthen project and production funding in the Canton of Basel-Landschaft. In particular, it intends to work with the Association of Basel-Landschaft Municipalities (VBLG) to develop structures that enable better coordination between the canton and the municipalities in the area of cultural promotion.

The current cultural treaty (cultural treaty lump sum) will remain unchanged until the end of 2021 and will be replaced by the new cultural treaty in January 2022. The two governments will submit the new treaty, the joint report and the two parliamentary bills for consultation at the beginning of 2019.
 

Public music libraries are an indispensable part of music education, writes the German Music Council. With its new online service "Focus: Public Music Libraries", the German Music Information Center (MIZ) documents the current infrastructure of public music libraries.

The financial framework conditions for public music libraries are disastrous in many places in the world's fourth strongest industrialized nation, the Music Council continued. For this reason, the state parliaments and funding bodies are called upon to adequately equip the existing facilities and to eradicate the white spots through new facilities.

The MIZ's new online service has been created in cooperation with the German national group of the International Association of Music Libraries, Archives and Documentation Centers. Information on the individual public music libraries can be accessed via an interactive map. This includes the physical and digital holdings of the libraries, including their focal points and special collections. The new focus is rounded off with further information and picture galleries that provide an insight into the services and facilities of public music libraries.

More info: https://themen.miz.org/fokus-oeffentliche-musikbibliotheken

What effect does learning an instrument have on the personal development of children? What effect does making music together in a class have on togetherness and cohesion? The project "Class music-making in Lucerne" explores these and other questions. It is being carried out jointly by the Culture Portal School & Culture in the Canton of Lucerne (Schukulu) and Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts and was launched at the beginning of the new school year at the end of August.

As part of the project, four primary school classes in Buchrain, Emmenbrücke and Reussbühl will receive special music lessons over the next two years: the 80 or so children will learn to play a wind instrument as a class, giving them the opportunity to make music together, develop a lasting love of music and show their environment the importance of musical education. The Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts is coordinating and supporting the participating teachers and their classes and providing scientific support for the project.

Two music lessons per week are used for the project. The class teachers are each supported by a music teacher. Before the actual music reading and practicing begins, the pupils have to choose one of the wind instruments provided. Not only can they try them out, but they are also taught how to handle them carefully - after all, they are allowed to take the instruments home with them to practise on.

The "Klassenmusizieren in Luzern" project is supported by the Stiftung Mercator Schweiz, the Fondation Suisa and the Stiftung Kind & Musik.

MGG Online contains more than 19,000 articles written by 3,500 authors from 55 countries (cf. MGG is also to become a database, SMZ 19.4.2014). Around 18,000 of these are biographical entries on composers, singers, instrumentalists and theorists. Many articles deal with non-Western composers, musicians and writers, including numerous personalities from jazz and popular music, as well as instrument makers, publishers, musicologists, writers, librettists and visual artists. Over 1,300 factual articles present music aesthetics and theory, eras and genres, church music and pop music, instruments and manuscripts, as well as cities and countries.

All of this content can be found in a constantly updated and growing database. Using state-of-the-art search and browse functions, the detailed work lists can be sorted according to various criteria. Other features include easy switching between article versions, customizable user accounts (where bookmarks and annotations can be created, saved and shared with others), integrated translations from German into more than 100 languages and links to the extensive RILM Abstracts of Music Literature.

The price for private customers, who can subscribe immediately, is US $ 195 (plus VAT if applicable) per year.

www.mgg-online.com
 

According to the canton's press release, the program was originally set up to bring artists and the population together in a participatory manner. It is now being expanded and supplemented by a program section entitled "Cultural projects for a bilingual canton". A corresponding call for projects will be launched this fall.

The main idea behind the program launched at the beginning of 2016 was to promote artistic productions of various types and sizes at a local or regional level. These productions are created as part of a joint creative process between an existing or specially formed group of people and, depending on their needs and skills, professional artists. The projects are characterized by a participatory creative process and the interaction between professional artists and the civilian population.

At the end of 2017, a total of 17 projects were considered and supported in the canton. The program was able to be continued and expanded thanks to the acceptance. As a result, "Cultural Participation" has become an integral part of the Department of Culture, the canton continues.

An expansion of this program is planned from this autumn. The "Cultural projects for a bilingual canton" are intended to promote bilingualism and cultural exchange within the canton. The new program refers to innovative projects that bring together artists and cultural workers from both language regions of the canton. The aim is to promote joint cultural activities between German and French speakers and access to artistic and cultural activities in the other cantonal language for the people of Valais.

This new part is made possible by the support of the Federal Office of Culture as part of the program agreement "Promotion of bilingualism in the canton". In 2019 and 2020, projects will be supported in an initial pilot phase over a period of two years. "Cultural projects for a bilingual canton" is managed by the Department of Culture in collaboration with the Department of Economic Affairs and Education. Project dossiers must be submitted by January 15, 2019. Funding can amount to up to CHF 20,000 for projects within the scope of "Cultural participation" and up to CHF 10,000 for projects within the scope of "Cultural projects for a bilingual canton". A committee of experts determines which projects will be funded.
 

The rooster on Bern's Zytglogge not only crowed at the wrong time that day, but several times during the festival from September 5 to 9. The culprit was Markus Marti, time bell ringer for 40 years, who, together with Christoph Hess alias Strotter Inst., transformed the Bernese landmark into an impressive sound backdrop. Instead of just before the hour, as is usually the case, the rooster crowed in the middle of the hour. The tourists who stayed outside may have been pleased, but the visitors to the installation Crazy time bells probably even more. On the second floor of the tower, Marti masterfully manipulated the monumental clockwork, shortening the time and using the imposing machinery to produce a broad spectrum of sounds - coarse-mechanical in their handling, subtle in their effect - that perfectly matched the turntable composition specially conceived for the occasion. Closed season of Strotter Inst. was coordinated.

During the Bern Music Festival, the federal city is always transformed into one big concert venue. Landmarks, outer districts, even the station forecourt: everything is played. This year, often at unusual times. Under the festival motto "untimely", the festival management even dared visitors to attend a concert at 11:59 pm, shortly before the witching hour. In a private apartment in Münstergasse. After an intensive day at the festival, this is definitely not the best time to listen to the quiet, subtly changing sounds envisaged by Biel sound artist Jonas Kocher in his concept "Home (Münstergasse 37)". It was not due to the quality of the performance by Ensemble Aabat that some visitors soon lost their patience and left the old town apartment in a huff.

There was no lack of intensity in the concert three hours earlier in the Great Hall of the Reitschule. Two weighty works by Bernd Alois Zimmermann were on the program: the trumpet concerto Nobody knows de trouble I see (1954) and the ecclesiastic action I turned around and looked at all the injustice that happened under the sun (1970). Few composers in the 20th century dealt with questions of time as intensively as Zimmermann. He developed the concept of the "spherical shape of time", in which different layers of time can overlap, and wove different musical styles into an astonishingly homogeneous whole in his works. The appointment of the composer, who died in 1970 and would have been 100 years old this year, as the festival's Composer in Residence was an obvious choice.

The large Bern Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Mario Venzago precisely captured the mood of the trumpet concerto. The orchestra skillfully harmonized sonority and drive and allowed the music to tilt splendidly into the obligatory jazz furioso. The young trumpet virtuoso Simon Höfele knew how to shine incessantly. The Swiss Youth Choir (conducted by Nicolas Fink) then transported the audience to a completely different world. As a kind of conciliatory intermezzo between the two eruptive, accusatory blocks by Zimmermann, the young singers interwove Thomas Tallis' forty-part motet Spem in alium nunquam habui (around 1570) into a touching and dense continuum of sound, which came across well despite the sparse reverberation in the Reithalle. However, the ecclesiastical action for two speakers, baritone solo and orchestra left many listeners completely baffled. Robin Adams (baritone), Julia Kiesler (narrator) and Franz Mazura (narrator) gave it their all, and the interpretation was strong. Zimmermann's last stand before his suicide, which often went beyond the pain threshold with its slanting orchestral passages, nevertheless left many question marks, and in a weak moment one found oneself wishing that the Bern Music Festival had appointed the timeless Thomas Tallis as composer in residence instead of Zimmermann.

Jürg Kienberger as Interluder in Residence and Christian Grüny as Festival Philosopher, on the other hand, left unrestricted feelings of happiness in their wake. Kienberger repeatedly appeared in concerts with subtle little disruptive maneuvers, for example late at night in the French Church, to stylishly counteract the performance of two funeral cantatas by Bach and Telemann. The interpretation of the cantatas themselves by the vocal ensemble BernVocal, accompanied by a top-class ensemble of soloists, reached heavenly spheres.

Grüny in turn interluded wittily under the motto "Resonance and Repetition" in the art museum, which, with the Hodler paintings currently on display, provided a pleasant atmosphere for the performance of two contrasting cello pieces by Zimmermann and Michael Pelzel.
 

In der Zeitkugel, concert in the large hall of the Berner Reitschule

Simon Hofele, trumpet; Robin Adams, baritone; Franz Mazura, narrator; Julia Kiesler, narrator; Bern Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Mario Venzago; Swiss Youth Choir, conducted by Nicolas Fink

To uncover the secret of the groove, music psychologist Olivier Senn and his team launched an online listening experiment two years ago in which participants evaluated reconstructed drum patterns from 248 songs. The songs came from very different genres. 665 people, mostly from Switzerland and Germany, took part.

The evaluations revealed numerous small rhythmic effects: Professional and amateur musicians reacted positively to complexity, while amateurs were just as keen to move to simple rhythms. However, personal musical taste had a much greater influence: participants rated a drum pattern significantly better if they thought it came from a style they liked or from a song they knew.

As a next step, the Lucerne researchers have revised their groove questionnaire to better distinguish between taste and motor reactions. The new questionnaire is currently being tested as part of a broad-based survey to which everyone is invited.

Link to the survey: http://www.hslu.ch/groove-questionnaire

The study conducted by AudienceNet examined music usage in a total of 20 of the world's largest music markets. Internet users between the ages of 16 and 64 were surveyed in Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Mexico, the Netherlands, Poland, Russia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, the UK and the USA. The survey was also conducted in China and India, but these results were not included in the global figures.

At 66% of respondents, the most frequently mentioned place where music is listened to is the car. At 77%, Germany is well above the average here after South Africa (80%) and ahead of the USA (75%). Streaming is practically ubiquitous: 86% listen to music via on-demand services. Young music consumers are the most active streamers, with 57% of 16 to 24-year-olds using a paid audio streaming service, rising to 61% in Germany.

Licensed music is predominant in the fast-growing music markets: in China and India, for example, 96% of consumers use licensed offerings.user upload services continue to dominate on-demand usage: almost half of the time spent streaming music is spent on YouTube. Copyright infringement remains a significant problem: more than a third (38%) of consumers obtain music through infringing channels, with streamripping being the predominant method (32%).

Link to the report:
http://www.musikindustrie.de/fileadmin/bvmi/upload/05_Presse/01_Pressemitteilungen/2018/IFPI_Consumer_Insight_Report_2018_FINAL.pdf

Published since 1960 by the International Gustav Mahler Society, the symphonies have been published by four different publishers and have since undergone a series of improved subsequent and corrected new editions. This poses a number of practical problems for the user: on the one hand, the variety of differently revised editions is confusing. On the other hand, consistency between scores and performance material is not always guaranteed.

Based on a presumed "last-hand version", a new critical review of the musical text seemed necessary in order to offer greater reliability in terms of content. Without fundamentally questioning the source evaluation of the Complete Critical Edition, according to the publisher, a large number of clarifications were achieved and editorial inconsistencies and errors that have since become known were corrected.

Breitkopf & Härtel therefore gave top priority to improving the performance material. The new typesetting of the score and orchestral parts in a larger format and Rastral ensures a uniform appearance and optimum legibility for the first time. Close cooperation with librarians from leading international orchestras guarantees that special practical aspects of the orchestral parts are taken into account, such as transposed parts for interchangeable instruments that are rarely used today or additional parts for instruments positioned off-stage or for instrumental amplification.

Philipp Klahm sees himself as a choirmaster and a teacher of voices. For him, "working" with a choir means in particular "working on the voice". For him, the voice is something unique. "Everyone has their own voice. It takes courage to make it sound in a choir." As a choirmaster, he finds it exciting to shape voices, to grab the singers and motivate them so that their voices blossom and harmonize with each other. It's something that the audience also appreciates: "It's so nice to hear a cleanly sung major chord and let it sink in."

Klahm now lives in Constance. He grew up in the tranquil town of Calw, the birthplace of Hermann Hesse in Baden-Württemberg. He first attended the children's choir there at the age of six. He took piano lessons and started playing the trumpet at the age of nine. He grew up with the choirs, so to speak: children's choir, school choir, men's choir CalvVoci, which he directs today. He appreciates making music together and the social contact in the town band. During high school, he played his trumpet in various formations, from traditional brass band music to classical orchestra and various jazz formations such as big band or funk band.
 

It is surprising that Philipp Klahm is not studying music at university, but German studies and theology. Music should remain an intense hobby. "When I got home at 5 p.m., I lived for music." In other words, for the trumpet and choral music. He now sings motets and oratorios in the Tübingen Academic Choir. "My musical life was exciting." His singing teacher advises him to apply for the entrance exam to a music academy. Philipp Klahm passed and began studying school music in Karlsruhe: choral conducting, singing, piano and music theory. He continued his humanities studies in Tübingen. One day he is in Tübingen, the other in Karlsruhe. It soon became clear that he was most enthusiastic about choral conducting and working with the voice. In 2011, he graduated in school music, and a year later also completed his studies in Tübingen. This was followed by a master's degree in choral and orchestral conducting at the Trossingen University of Music.

The Trossingen University Choir specializes in oratorio literature: Klahm conducts Mendelssohn's EliasStravinsky's Symphony of PsalmsBach's St. Matthew Passion. While still a student, he took on a teaching position at the University of Erfurt. He teaches choral conducting, voice training and conducting to school musicians. He also conducts the university choir with 110 singers. With his Master's degree in the bag, he is assistant conductor and répétiteur at the Basel Boys' Choir for a year. Since 2016, he has conducted the traditional Rottweiler Münster Boys' Choir. He is still closely associated with his male choir CalvVoci. The ensemble of former choirboys performs at the highest level, is a regular guest at renowned competitions and regularly wins prizes.

What motivated the young choirmaster to take over the Lucerne Concert Choir with its predominantly older ladies and gentlemen? "I don't think the singers are that old." Diplomacy or a genuine personal assessment? His answer goes further. "For me, the exciting question was what it's like to work with a mixed choir of four to eight voices. What literature can I perform?" Klahm covers all genres with his various choirs: The Konzertchor Luzern interprets great concert literature, the Neuhauser Kantorei focuses on sacred music, the Rottweiler Münstersänger on the tradition of the boys' choir and the men's choir CalvVoci sings contemporary music. "I find that so enriching, it always results in new projects."

Klahm is currently rehearsing for his first performance with the Lucerne Concert Choir at the KKL. He is surprised at how well the choir has progressed: "It sounds like Puccini and Verdi. The overall sound has become bigger, fuller and rounder." He thinks the chosen works are great. Verdi's Stabat Mater contains all moods from the mourning of the mother to the timbre of paradise. "These are rapidly changing images: The tonal changeover is a challenge for any choir. In addition, the wonderful mass by Puccini with operatic melodies that the choir sings with joy and pleasure."