Die Wiener Sängerknaben

The first reference to choirboys in Vienna Castle dates back to 1296. Two hundred years later, on July 7, 1498, the future Roman-German Emperor Maximilian I founded a chapel in Vienna in which boys were to sing alongside adult singers; choirboys from Augsburg, Innsbruck and Freiburg im Breisgau were sent to Vienna for this purpose. They were to sing "an ambt" every day. This laid the foundation for the Vienna Boys' Choir. Like their modern-day successors, the boys were always "on the road" with their imperial employer - they sang at imperial festivals, coronations, weddings, processions and court festivals. Over the centuries, the Viennese court attracted brilliant musicians such as Heinrich Isaac, Johann Josef Fux, Christoph Willibald Gluck and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Joseph and Michael Haydn and Franz Schubert sang in the choir as boys; Anton Bruckner was their singing and piano teacher.