-Herbert von Karajan

-Sir Simon Rattle

 

 

From a singing circle to a world-famous boys choir – an unprecedented success story.

 

The Tölzer Boys' Choir has roots leading to a Boy Scout troop formed after the 2nd World War in Bad Tölz, whereby folk and hiking songs were routinely sung during group activities. The 18-year-old high school student Gerhard Schmidt took on the leadership of the singing group when the Boy Sc

out troop disbanded in January of 1956 thereby laying the foundation for the unprecedented success of the Tölzer Boys' Choir.

 

The Choir has rehearsed in Munich since 1971. Two hundred boys in four developmental ranks are instructed by artistic directors Christian Fliegner and Clemens Haudum, the director of the soloist division Ursula Richter as well as eight additional singing educators. After their voices change, the students are trained in their own men’s chorus. Now as then, the chorus receives guidance and support from its founder Professor Gerhard Schmidt-Gaden.

 

Joy in singing, creativity, spontaneity and self-discipline form the basis for the boys’ training. In the concert choir, they sing music from the Middle Ages to the present in up to 250 concerts and opera productions around the world yearly. Sacred music from the baroque and classical periods is an important focal point. The soloists of the Tölzer Boys' Choir achieved renown singing the roles of the "Drei Knaben", or three boys, in Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s opera Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute), which is now in its twelfth CD and DVD production with the Tölzer boys.