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The Germasn conductor, choir director, organist and harpsichordist, Christian Kabitz, received his training as a church musician and orchestral and choral conductor and keyboard player, with Diethard Hellmann and Hermann Michael in Munich.
Concentrating initially on church music, Christian Kabitz has in the last thirty years become well known both nationally and internationally as a harpsichordist, organist, and - primarily - conductor through countless concerts and broadcasts of choral, operatic and orchestral works spanning Renaissance music to compositions of contemporary composers. Kantor of the St John Church (St. Johannis) in Würzburg, he created in 1979 the Würzburger Bach-Chor and the Bach Orchestra in Würzburg. In 1986, he was named Choir Master of the Bachchor Heidelberg. Since 1988, he is artistic and Musical Director of the Cäcilien-Chor in Frankfurt.
With three big choirs for adult amateurs together with a children's choir that he rehearses and directs with his boundless enthusiasm and energy, Christian Kabitz is making an outstanding contribution to furthering the appreciation and love of music. Supplementing regular rehearsals, he organizes voice training and ensemble singing in small groups, thus adding greatly to the capabilities and cohesion within his body of singers.
Beyond the world of the performance of music, Christian Kabitz founded the "Bach Collegium" in Munich (1974), started and manages the annual Bach festival in Würzburg, organizes the International Bach-Händel festival in Würzburg, and is an innovative composer with Rock Requiem (1980) and Cosmogenia (1989). Since 1989 he has produced, directed and conducted Mozart, Rossini, and Georg Philipp Telemann operas for television and for opera festivals in both France and Germany. Christian Kabitz also gave life in 1999 to the "Bürklins Sommeroper", a festival of operas where he was not only conductor but also producer. He also gives frequent concerts with the Munich Bachsolisten and the Stuttgarter Kammerorchester, some of which are choral with one or more of his choirs, and some orchestral.
In recent years Christian Kabitz has begun organizing family concerts in Frankfurt's "Old Opera House" ("Alte Oper") directed primarily at children -- he chooses the music and then introduces each item to the audience: all tickets are snapped up every time.
In 1991, 1993 and 2000 Christian Kabitz was invited to conduct concerts in Israel, in Jerusalem, Haifa and Tel Aviv performing J.S. Bach cantatas, Johannes Brahms' Deutsches Requiem and Arnold Schoenberg's Survivor from Warsaw. In 1996 he made his first tour in the USA with a selection from his three choirs he conducted with great success three times the Requiem by Giuseppe Verdi and twice Carmina Burana by Carl Orff. In 2001, was a great first concert tour to Japan. In 2005 he appeared with three concerts at the German Cultural Week in Shanghai, in 2006 he was invited back to China to perform three Mozart concerts.
The success of Christian Kabitz' work is seen not only in the ever rising standard of performance - and the great demand for his services - but also officially in the shape of major public awards: He received 1984 the title of Church Conductor ("Kirchenmusikdirektor") for his contributions to the music; in 1986 the State Award of the Free State of Bavaria as a conductor; in 2004 Culture Prize of the City of Würzburg; and in 2007 Main Prize of the Bücher-Dieckmeyer-Stiftung for his work in the service of the Protestant church |
