The Vienna Boys’ Choir Comes to San Diego

The Vienna Boys’ Choir has been singing and performing since the age of Columbus. Founded in 1498, they’re one of the oldest boys’ singing groups not attached to a church or college (they sang for the Austrian court), and have always been a traveling band. This month, the San Diego Symphony is bringing them to the New World.

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The choir members range in age from 10 to 14, and hail from 31 countries. They live in the Palais Augarten boarding school, a former Viennese imperial palace and hunting lodge, and spend about 10 weeks a year on the road in four equally talented groups.

The music program for their holiday tour combines the sacred and the secular, including Christmas carols, an Austrian folk song, a Strauss polka, “Salve Regina,” “Ave Maria” (by Franz Schubert, who was once in the choir), a cantata by Mozart (who also worked with the choir in his time), and “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.”

Symphony CEO Martha Gilmer says, “There’s no doubt they are one of the world’s greatest choral ensembles, with an incredible place in musical history.”

The Vienna Boys’ Choir Comes to San Diego

The Vienna Boys’ Choir