Vienna Unwrapped Inspiration and Planning For Independent Travellers who are visiting Vienna
When does the Vienna Boys Choir stage events in Vienna and how to get tickets? To help you experience the Wiener Sängerknaben during your stay, I’m sharing their schedule in 2024 at different locations and how to get tickets.
Throughout the classical world, these boys’ voices are known for their pure and clear quality: There is this crystalline clarity in their vocal delivery, especially in the upper registers. This purity makes their voices so ethereal. As a whole, the choir achieves a remarkable blend among the voices, crucial in choral singing.
Before you travel to Vienna learn where best to hear their angelic voices, see them and even meet and greet the choir boys.
1. Boys Choir Sunday Mass
Almost every Sunday (except summer) the Vienna choir boys sing at Wiener Hofburgkapelle in the Imperial Palace. Because of their tremendous worldwide fame they tend to overshadow the Vienna Court Music Ensemble (Wiener Hofmusikkapelle) that supports them so brilliantly: Few people know that members of the Vienna State Opera men’s choir and members of the Vienna State Opera Orchestra, most of which are also members of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, power the Hofmusikkapelle. To round up the experience, the traditional location also boasts excellent acoustics.
Vienna Boys Choir Schedule at Hofburg: every Sunday, 9.15 am;
Location: Wiener Hofburgkapelle, Hofburg-Schweizerhof, A-1010 Vienna
Tickets: EUR 53/EUR 43;
Bookings: You can book online without having to queue. Tickets can be delivered directly to your hotel. Alternatively, tickets can be bought on-site on Fridays between 11 am and 1 pm, and between 3 pm and 5 pm, or before Sunday Mass from 8.15 am to 8.45 am.
Note: As usual with masses, you will only hear the choir as they will be up on the choir balcony. After the mass, you will see the boys when they perform a few songs at the altar.
2. Christmas In Vienna Gala
Each year, the Wiener Sängerknaben lend their angelical voices to one of the most renowned Christmas concerts in the world. In the Art Nouveau Grand Hall of Wiener Konzerthaus, the traditional Christmas in Vienna Gala excels with a mix of classical seasonal songs and popular Christmas music. While top opera singers usually support the Vienna Boys Choir’s Christmas songs you can expect other great artists to join at the evening.
To enable a wider audience to experience this exceptional concert a pre-premiere concert takes place the day before the grand gala, performing the same pieces.
Schedule ‘Christmas In Vienna’: 19th December 2024 (pre-premiere), 20th December 2024 (Gala)
Location: Wiener Konzerthaus, Lothringer Strasse, 1030 Vienna;
Tickets: EUR 118 to EUR 243 (pre-premiere); EUR 156 to EUR 243
Bookings: book tickets
3. Concerts At Augarten
Just next to the choir boys’ boarding school at baroque Augarten palace the Vienna Boys Choirs have their own concert hall. Not only does the MuTh serve as the boys’ main place to rehearse, and perform (mostly classical) concerts, and their own children’s operas.
On a few selected dates the Vienna Boys Choir perform at different events. For example, in January they stage their own Concert In the New Year. Among the highlights are Mozart’s Kleine Nachtmusik (A Little Night Music), Schubert’s Erlkönig (The Erlking), Schumann’s Zigeunerleben (The Gypsy Life). And like at the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra’s world famous New Year’s expect lots of Strauss Music: the Emperor Waltz, the Tritsch-Tratsch Polka, and Dorfschwalben aus Österreich (Village Swallows from Austria).
Schedule at Augarten: 18th January 2024 (Concert In The New Year); Friday afternoons with the Vienna Boys Choir: 1st March, 26th April, 3rd, 17th and 31st May, 7th, 14th and 21st June 2024
Location: MuTh concert hall, Am Augartenspitz 1, 1020 Vienna;
Tickets: from EUR 34;
Bookings: get tickets
4. Concerts at Theater Im Park
Under the name ‘O Sole Mio’ the choir boys will present various popular sommer songs beneath the mighty plane trees of the private gardens of the Princes of Schwarzenberg’s palace. As part of the open air event series Theater Im Park, the programme introduces the local public to the Wiener Sängerknaben’s non-classical range.
Schedule: 15th September 2024, 11.00 am
Location: Theater Im Park, 1030 Vienna;
Tickets: from EUR 29
Bookings: buy tickets
Biography And Repertoire of The Wiener Sängerknaben
More than 500 years ago, in 1498, the Choir started as a group of six boys of Emperor Maximilian I’s court band. After the First World War and the abolition of the monarchy in Austria, the choir turned into a private association. Since then, the approximately 100 boys between 10 and 14 years of age dress in sailor suits, sing in four different choir groups at various public occasions and tour the world. The Vienna Boys Choir became international superstars not least since Walt Disney’s film Almost Angels (1962).
The Vienna Boys Choir’s repertoire ranges from Medieval music, to Renaissance (Gallus, Victoria, Monteverdi), to Baroque (Bach, Händel), Classical (Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven), and Romantic music (Schubert, Bruckner); it also includes polka and waltzes by the Strauss dynasty. The boys have also lent their voices to modern music (Benjamin Britten, Leonard Bernstein, Gustav Mahler), folk, pop and world music. and regularly perform in operas for children.
visit Vienna Secret Classical Music Treat – Mozart Off-Path
find out more about Vienna New Year’s Concert Ticket Information
explore my full list of Vienna Concerts tips – Quality Music Events in My Hometown
go to Augarten – Porcelain Museum, Vienna Boys Choir And More
explore concerts at Stephansdom – St. Stephen’s Cathedral from Catacombs To Concerts
back to Vienna Attractions
go to What To Do In Vienna
back to Vienna Unwrapped homepage
