CV
Christian Bährens is choral conductor, composer and music teacher in his hometown Berlin where he studied Music and English at university. He was member of conducting masterclasses with Heinz Hennig and Laszlo Heltay and subsequently founded the Wilmerdorfer Kammerchor and the vocal ensemble Cantico Nuovo. He has also directed the Matthäuskantorei Steglitz and the choir of Beethoven Gymnasium for many years.
In 2011 he was promoted Doctor of Music by Bydgoszcz University in Poland and has since then been invited several times as lecturer for choral music, conducting and voice training by Poznan Music Academy, Bydgoszcz University and different institutions in Berlin and around.
As singer he has committed himself to the song repertoire of the 19th and 20th century and realised projects like Schubert’s Winterreise und Vaughan Williams’ Songs of travel.
Six years ago he started his stronger activity as composer, initiated by a wonderful cooperation with the Norwegian female choir EMBLA and supported by his publisher Jan Stefan Bengtsson. His works have since then been published in Norway and Germany, most recently Dona nobis pacem – a prayer for the Ukraine and Five German Advent Songs. His current projects include the solo song cycles Four Shelley songs and Emily Brontë songs and the motets Cantico delle creature for female choir and Libera me for mixed choir.
This year his two major works will be premiered: the cycle Shakespearean Women for female voices by Concentus in Sandnes (Norway) on 26th March and his German Requiem for mixed choir a cappella by Cantico Nuovo on 24th September in Berlin.