25 years of Calmus Ensemble

Anyone who knows us personally may be aware that we love to celebrate birthdays extensively. Everyone is always given a surprise happy birthday garland and cake. This year we have had to be pretty restrained because the presents got out of hand last year. But this year there is an important birthday that requires no restraint.

Calmus turns 25!

That calls for a big celebration! And since this is not an insignificant number, we are really going all out for this anniversary! You already know the rough dates. And since our last newsletter, it should be clear to you that this time it is not just a single day, but a whole weekend of celebrations! Today we finally give you the details of our festivities.

Under the title “25 Wünsche” (25 wishes), we will present the first of the two celebratory concerts on Friday, November 22, 2024 at 7:30 pm in St. Nicholas Church (Nikolaikirche). There you can experience first-hand how your wonderful submissions have been and will be transformed into art! Bernd Franke, who is probably known to many of you for his popular composition “And why?”, is writing a piece especially for this occasion, which will be premiered that evening. Calmus founding member Ludwig Böhme will give a speech, for which we would like to thank you, dear Ludwig, in advance. And what about us? Yes, we will sing for you with all we have got! The title already alludes to the central theme of this concert, which is very important to us: wishes for the future of our world.

For friends and companions, there will be a champagne reception in the Old St. Nicholas School (Alte Nikolaischule) afterwards. We thank you for your understanding that the reception will be for invited guests only!

The second celebratory concert will – we can safely say – be no less special! We are combining our own jubilee with another artistically significant anniversary. Almost to the day, it will be the fiftieth anniversary of the death of Frank Martin, whose epically beautiful Mass for double choir is just the right music to celebrate a quarter of a century of existence of the Calmus Ensemble. Joining us are friends who are closely connected to the biographies of some of the members of our current line-up. We are delighted that the wonderful colleagues from Sjaella and Singer Pur will be joining us for this unique evening! For the musical direction of the Martin Mass, we have been able to win over the up-and-coming conductor Annabelle Weinhart!

“Elemente” (Elements) is the name of the concert that on November 23, 2024 at 7:00 pm will fill St. Peter's Church (Peterskirche) with Martin's touching sounds. Each of the three ensembles will also have their own personal musical say on the topic of the climate crisis.

The BUND Leipzig regional group and KliX³ will provide us with content-related support on this topic.

Ticket sales start immediately at all common Reservix advance booking offices and online:

Concert #1 “25 Wünsche” (25 wishes)

Concert #2 “Elemente” (Elements)

As there are some special features to ticket sales this year, we would like to pick out a few of them and briefly explain them here:

• Anyone aged 25 can attend both concerts free of charge upon presentation of an identity document at the box office.

• The same applies to children and young people under the age of 18.

• ONLY November 22 “2 for 1”: Upon presentation of a discounted ticket, pupils, students and trainees may take one other person who is also a pupil, student or trainee to the concert free of charge.

You can find all further information at the link above.

Leipzig citizens also have the opportunity to purchase tickets at Musikalienhandlung Oelsner as well as at Ticketgalerie.

But until then, we still have many, many concerts to sing at, and we look forward to seeing you there! As always, you will find a list of all the concerts up to our anniversary at the end of this email.

List of concerts until the end of November: