The size of the Chorus is irrelevant.
Conservatory Training:
And the Bavarian Radio Choir is certainly one of them with their level of choral perfection.
“Any Chorus can sing loudly.” That’s what a soprano chorister in the Choral Arts Society of Washington told me one night in the Kennedy Center Concert Hall when I was complimenting the superb University of Maryland Chorus (also known locally as The Maryland Chorus) on stage. This chorister couldn’t find anything what-so-ever positive to say about The Maryland Chorus, even though they gave a memorable and outstanding performance of Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam, with Claudio Abbado conducting. I think she thought that the Choral Arts Society should have been on stage. Whereas The Washington Post music critic wrote about the performance, “The University of Maryland Chorus was glorious throughout.”
In hindsight, I should have told her in response to her, “Any Chorus can sing loudly” comment: Yes, including your Choral Arts Society, but only the finest Choruses can sing loudly and beautifully, as the University of Maryland Chorus did. But unfortunately, she was a cultist of the Choral Arts Society. To be clear, both the Choral Arts Society and the Oratorio Society sang beautifully when they sang loudly.
I say that because I liked all three Orchestra Choruses — 1) the Choral Arts Society of Washington, 2) the University of Maryland Chorus and 3) the Oratorio Society of Washington (which later changed their name to The Washington Chorus). I was not a cultist of any. I had my preference — which was for the University of Maryland Chorus — but I liked all three. I thought they were all excellent, which is why they got engagements with the NSO.
At that time, I did notice that The Maryland Chorus was getting some pretty hot engagements. Dr. Paul Traver later told me that The Maryland Chorus got the engagements with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam through Margaret Hillis (Founder and Director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Chorus). Claudio Abbado had contacted her in Chicago and asked her to recommend an Orchestra Chorus in the DC area, and she recommended the University of Maryland Chorus. She had previously worked with them during a choral workshop on the College Park campus.
But my immature chorister friend didn’t have the maturity to say anything positive about The Maryland Chorus. Unfortunately, there were choristers in the Choral Arts Society who were jealous of the engagements that The Maryland Chorus was receiving — I think they thought Choral Arts should have had those engagements — so there was resentment of the University of Maryland Chorus by some of the Choral Arts people and some made snide remarks about The Maryland Chorus.
Dr. Traver accepted the engagements he was offered. He didn’t “storm into the Kennedy Center and demand that his Maryland Chorus perform with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam” as some basses in the Choral Arts Society said/lied about during our break. Dr. Traver would never have done something like that because he would have known that doing so would end the University of Maryland Chorus ever being invited back again. Also, the conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra at that time was Antal Doráti, and the University of Maryland Chorus had quite a legacy under Doráti. That’s because they were his favourite Chorus, and he invited them to perform with the NSO as often as possible.
On my first visit to the Kennedy Center from the Conservatory where I was training, I noticed the performance schedule for the Concert Hall’s resident National Symphony Orchestra and I also noticed that it appeared that the University of Maryland Chorus was practically the Official Chorus of the National Symphony Orchestra. This is what I remember seeing on the NSO’s schedule, and I think they had a couple of other engagements that season:
VERDI/REQUIEM
UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND CHORUS
Paul Traver director
NATIONAL SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
Antal Doráti, Music Director
MAHLER/SYMPHONY NO 2 (The Resurrection)
UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND CHORUS
Paul Traver director
NATIONAL SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
Antal Doráti, Music Director
BEETHOVEN/SYMPHONY NO 9 (Choral)
UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND CHORUS
Paul Traver director
NATIONAL SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
Antal Doráti, Music Director
There were a couple of performances listed for Norman Scribner’s Choral Arts Society of Washington (they were excellent as well) and Robert Shafer’s Oratorio Society of Washington (also excellent), but the University of Maryland Chorus was the most featured Chorus.
Speaking of Beethoven/Symphony No 9 (the last piece above I remember seeing on the NSO’s season subscription when I went to the Kennedy Center), during their tenure, The Maryland Chorus performed Beethoven’s Ninth over 38 times with various (inter)national orchestras upon invitation. On one of those occasions, below is what was written about their performance at Wolf Trap:
National Symphony Orchestra & University of Maryland Chorus
“…an excellent performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony was presented to an overflow audience Saturday night at Wolf Trap. This excellence, however, was a last-minute development, and primary credit goes not to the National Symphony, which was the orchestra for the occasion, but to the University of Maryland Chorus, which came to the orchestra’s rescue. The Chorus—one of the best—celebrated its 20th anniversary and its 36th Beethoven Ninth by singing the final movement as well as I have ever heard it sung, live or on records.”
Source: National Symphony Orchestra & University of Maryland Chorus (Joseph McLellan)
In the performance above from Deutschland, you can hear the superb Bavarian Radio Choir — which is the official Chorus of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra — sing quietly and beautifully beginning at 1.07.50 and 1.11.11. This is choral excellence at its highest level.
You can also hear them sing quietly and beautifully in the Schumann piece below, Nachtlied.
From AI:
“Peter Dijkstra is the Artistic and Chorus Director for the Bavarian Radio Choir. He has held this title since the 2022-2023 season. He also led the Choir from 2005 to 2016. Sir Simon Rattle has served as the Choir’s Chief Conductor since 2023.”
My choral friend said: “Considering the state the US is in, how can anyone claim that ‘the US is the greatest country in the history of the world?'” Insanity.
The US federal government has ended funding for the public broadcasting media in the US under the dictator’s regime.
In Deutschland, their public broadcasting media is just the opposite:
Deutschland’s public broadcasting network (ARD) and its associated broadcasting entities officially operate 11 Radio Orchestras. In addition to these symphonic and radio ensembles, the network manages multiple professional big bands and 7 Radio Orchestra Choruses across the country:
The 11 radio orchestras include::
Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra (BRSO)
Munich Radio Orchestra (Münchner Rundfunkorchester)
NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra
NDR Radiophilharmonie
WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne
WDR Funkhausorchester
Frankfurt Radio Symphony (hr-Sinfonieorchester)
SWR Symphony Orchestra
German Radio Philharmonic Saarbrücken Kaiserslautern (SR/SWR)
Deutschland officially has seven paid Radio Choruses, all of which are publicly funded and associated with the country’s public broadcasting networks (ARD) and Deutschlandradio:
Rundfunkchor Berlin (Berlin Radio Choir)
RIAS Kammerchor (Berlin)
MDR Rundfunkchor (Leipzig)
WDR Rundfunkchor (Cologne)
NDR Chor (Hamburg)
SWR Vokalensemble (Stuttgart)
BR-Chor (Bavarian Radio Chorus in Munich)
Whereas, the so-called “greatest country in the history of the world (the US)” has nothing like this. There is no National Public Radio Symphony Orchestra and Radio Chorus, for example, and there never has been.
There are a couple other performances of the Mahler 2nd that come close to this level of choral excellence, but these performances above are the finest and the best recorded. In the other performances, I didn’t like where the Chorus was seated — they were practically up at the ceiling!…not really but you get the point — or the camera work on the Chorus, and the audio wasn’t quite as good, but I think part of the problem was the Concert Hall they were performing in and the acoustic shells or canopies above the stage.
At the end of the Schumann (video above), the First Concertmaster took his bow and applauded the Chorus for their outstanding performance. My choral friend said: “I wouldn’t have even noticed that if you hadn’t pointed in out, and I think only another musician would have noticed that.” Perhaps.
The Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra apparently wanted their Chorus to have an encore, so they sang this piece by Purcell, another example of singing beautifully quietly: