World Youth Choir 2024

Auditions

Session hosted in Germany
Touring Germany, the Netherlands and Italy (tbc)
Contact: manager@worldyouthchoir.org
WYC patrons:

WYC 2024 session organisers:
With the support of:1

Information about the 2024 session
In the Summer of 2024, the World Youth Choir will have a special session joining
the National Youth Orchestra of Germany – Bundesjugendorchester (BJO) - for a
programme with Beethoven’s 9th Symphony and a commissioned work by Tan Duncalled “Nine - Ode to Compassion”. The Session will be a unique experience for the80-100 young singers from around the world and for the audiences who will attend
their high-quality concerts.
The rehearsal session will be hosted in Weikersheim (DE) from 18th August to
28th August, where the choir and orchestra will have time to work on the pieces
both separately and as a combined ensemble. This will be an opportunity to not
only make music together but also get to know musicians from other countries anddiscuss the impact of international cooperation projects on their professional
development, through complementary networking activities which will be present
in the programme.
Following the rehearsals, the World Youth Choir and National Youth Orchestra ofGermany will go on an exciting international tour of concerts (29th August to 8thSeptember), featuring the World premiere of Tan Dun’s piece “Nine - Ode toCompassion”. The concert tour will take the choir and orchestra to prestigious
festivals and concert halls in different cities in Germany, to the Netherlands andItaly (tbc), the final concert will take place on the opening weekend of the
Beethovenfest in Bonn (DE).
Dates● Arrival day: 18th August 2024
● Departure: 8 September 2024
Working language
Events are conducted in English. Intermediate level of English is required.

2Requirements to participate:
We are looking for singers who:● are passionate and experienced high level choral singers or soloists;● are between 17 and 26 years old on August 1, 2024;● have basic or professional music education;● are ready to improve their singing and social skills;● want to meet new friends all over the world;● are eager and curious to learn in a multicultural environment.

Conditions provided
For the selected singers, from arrival at a host country until departure, allaccommodation, transportation, meals and music materials are provided by theorganisation, and a certificate of participation (diploma) is issued to each singer.
Selected participants are responsible for:● Travel to and from the host country/final concert tour destination● Preparation of the chosen repertoire in advance, at home (music material in adigital package will be sent to all selected singers by email)● Visas and all other official documents as well as health and travel insurance, etc.
● Pocket money3

Why should you join?
Beyond the project itself, the World Youth Choir is a way to network with choral
youth in the world. Selected singers/session participants are considered cultural“ambassadors” of their country. In return they make friends with young people
from all over the world, learn of new/different singing techniques, improve
interpretation as well as stage performance capacity while singing choral music ofvarious styles, time periods and the many genres of each continent, learn aboutother cultures and bring back home choral music from different world countries.
The World Youth Choir by its music, performances and presence (sessions) indifferent regions of the world, each or every other year, sends a message of peace,brotherhood, and the vitality of life itself. UNESCO named the World Youth Choir“Artist for Peace” in 1996, recognising its success as a platform for interculturaldialogue through music.
Participation fee
The participation fee for singers is 100€, to be paid to the World Youth Choir
Foundation after the results of the international jury by the selected singers.
In addition, each participant is granted a free, one-year membership in theInternational Federation for Choral Music.

Organisers of the 2024 World Youth Choir Session● Deutscher Musikrat; www.musikrat.de● Bundesjugendorchester; www.bundesjugendorchester.de● European Choral Association; www.europeanchoralassociation.org● In partnership with: Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and theMedia (BKM)

World Youth Choir Patrons● International Federation for Choral Music (IFCM); www.ifcm.net● Jeunesses Musicales International (JMI); www.jmi.net● European Choral Association; www.europeanchoralassociation.org

4Artistic team & Repertoire
Tan Dun
Conductor of the World
Youth Choir 2024 session
Composer of thecommissioned piece “Nine Ode to Compassion”
The world-renowned artist
and UNESCO Global Goodwill
Ambassador Tan Dun, hasmade an indelible mark on theworld’s music scene with acreative repertoire that spansthe boundaries of classicalmusic,
multimedia
performance, and Eastern andWestern traditions. A winnerof today’s most prestigious
honors including the Grammy
Award,
Oscar/AcademyAward, Grawemeyer Award,
Bach Prize, ShostakovichAward, and most recently Italy’s Golden Lion Award for Lifetime Achievement, Tan
Dun’s music has been played throughout the world by leading orchestras, operahouses, international festivals, and on radio and television. Most recently, Tan Dun
was named as Dean of the Bard College Conservatory of Music. As dean, Tan Dun
will further demonstrate music’s extraordinary ability to transform lives and guidethe Conservatory in fulfilling its mission of understanding music’s connection tohistory, art, culture, and society.
As a conductor of innovative programs around the world, Tan Dun has led theChina tours of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra and Japan’s NHK SymphonyOrchestra. His current season includes leading the Orchestre National de Lyon in asix-city China tour, the Guangzhou Symphony Orchestra in a four-city tour of
Switzerland and Belgium as well as engagements with the Rai National SymphonyOrchestra, Oslo Philharmonic, Hong Kong Philharmonic and Melbourne SymphonyOrchestra where he was recently named Artistic Ambassador. Tan Dun currently
serves as the Principal Guest Conductor of the Shenzhen Symphony Orchestra. In
2016, Tan Dun conducted the grand opening celebration of Disneyland Shanghai

5which was broadcast to a record-breaking audience worldwide. Tan Dun has led theworld’s most esteemed orchestras, including the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra,London Symphony Orchestra, the Philadelphia Orchestra, Metropolitan OperaOrchestra, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic,
Orchestre National de France, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Filarmonica della Scala,Münchner Philharmoniker, the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa
Cecilia, Sydney Symphony Orchestra, among others.
For more information about Tan Dun’s life and work please visit www.tandun.com
Jörn Hinnerk Andresen
Conductor of the World Youth Choir2024 session
Jörn Hinnerk Andresen was born in
the region of Schleswig-Holstein. He
studiedconducting,piano andharpsichordin
DresdenandAmsterdam.
After having worked in Zwickau andKoblenz, he joined the Munich
Gärtnerplatztheater in 2008 as choral
director and kapellmeister. Not only
has he conducted over sixty operas,operettas and musicals, but also has
performed a wide repertoire of
Baroque music with the Baroqueorchestra ‘Cappella Confluentes’ of
which he is founding conductor.
Furthermore, he regularly worked forover five years with the choir of theVienna State Opera at the Salzburg
Festival and has been frequently
invited to conduct the radio choirs ofseveral German broadcasting stations, Danish Radio and Radio France. SinceFebruary 2015, Jörn Hinnerk Andresen is choral director of the Saxon State Opera
Choir Dresden. He is closely associated with ensembles such as Lauttencompagney
Berlin, of which he is a regular guest conductor, Staatskapelle Halle, Vocal NORDTOMSØ, the choir of the Munich State Opera and the Batzdorfer Hofkapelle.

6Having been a lecturer at the Universities of Music in Cologne and Dresden and amentor of the German Music Council in the Choral Conductors’; Forum for severalyear, Jörn Andresen now holds the chair for choral conducting at the Mozarteum
Salzburg for the winter semester 2019/20.
Soloists
The 2024 World Youth Choir and Bundesjugendorchester performances willfeature four World Youth Choir alumni as soloists.
Repertoire
The repertoire of the 2024 World Youth Choir session will be performed with theNational Youth Orchestra of Germany – Bundesjugendorchester (BJO). The
programme will be composed of Beethoven’s 9th Symphony and a commissioned
work by Tan Dun called “Nine - Ode to Compassion”.

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Auditions
The applicants’ audition should be recorded with the support of a recruiter and thecandidate should perform/record in the following order:
1. Range test: One scale sung forte a cappella on an open vowel presenting theentire voice-range, not exceeding 1'20'' in total.
2. Sight-reading: Applicants should record the melody as a piece of sight-reading.
They should use up to 10 minutes to look the exercise through (not using a piano,except for pitch) and record the first attempt in front of the jury/recruiter. The
exercise must be sung a cappella.
a. The sight-reading melody is provided to the candidate by therecruiter/jury on the day of the audition, and it should not be prepared inadvance. A prepared exercise can be noticed in the recording and will bedisqualified.
3. Prepared score: One obligatory choral excerpt from Beethoven’s 9th symphony.
Recruiters should provide the obligatory choral excerpt in advance to all
candidates in order to let them demonstrate their best ability in preparing at home.
The candidate should prepare at home and, at the audition, record their part, while
an accompanying person plays the other parts. The voice part sung by the applicant
should not be doubled by the piano.
4. Aria of choice: Singers must prepare and sing an aria of their choice, to be
performed at their audition and submitted their application.
The singers selected at national audition(s) are qualified for the final international
selection scheduled by World Youth Choir International Jury (January 2024). The
audition materials of those selected should be digitally submitted to the World
Youth Choir management through the online application form only and by thenational recruiter or a national recruiting institution/organisation providing allinformation requested.
World Youth Choir alumni can apply directly to the international selection througha direct application.

8Documents and information necessary to successfully submit an application:● Singer information required by the international application form
○ Singers should provide the information requested by the recruiter● Singer photo○ The singer’s face should be clearly visible○ JPEG file, preferably● Colour scan of singers’ passport. For singers who are residents of theEuropean Union and/or can travel to the countries of the tour using theirnational Identity Document (ID), the passport scan can be substituted by anID scan.
○ First page. Front and back, in case of ID scan.
○ JPEG file, preferably●4 mp3 audition files○ Vocal range○ Sight reading○ The obligatory choral excerpt○ An aria of the singer’s choiceDeadline for submissions to the international jury: December 22nd, 2023..
Recruiters might define an earlier deadline, in order to be able to process andsubmit the applicant’s information.
For more information please visit www.worldyouthchoir.org or contact
manager@worldyouthchoir.org.

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