Hans Rehberg
Simon Halsey

Hans Rehberg and Simon Halsey outline the challenges the Berlin Radio Choir has experienced in the last few decades and their artistic responses to them. Chiefly, they developed adventurous programming that takes both audience and chorus out of their comfort zones, such as a performance of J. S. Bach’s St. Matthew Passion staged by Peter Sellars, and a production of Gustav Holst’s Savitri in a night club. Besides these unorthodox and wildly successful productions, the Berlin Radio Choir has worked to promote singing in schools, as well as lobbied German politicians on local and national levels to continue government underwriting of choral music.