Philharmonia Chorus announces sudden death of its chief

The following message was sent out to all chorus members tonight:

With overwhelming sadness we announce the sudden and unexpected death of our beloved chorus master Stefan Bevier who’s died in his home in Berlin. Our hearts and prayers go out to his family as he’s already missed. 

Stefan, who was 59, had worked with the Philharmonia since 1999 and as chorus master since 2010.

A member of the Orchestra Academy of the Berlin Philharmonic, he studied singing with Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Schuch-Tovini and Aribert Reimann, and conducting with Sergiu Celibidache. He worked with Karajan, Eugen Jochum, Karl Böhm, Leonard Bernstein, Charles Dutoit, Lorin Maazel, Colin Davis, Riccardo Muti, Claudio Abbado, Sir Simon Rattle, Christoph von Dohnányi, Vladimir Ashkenazy and many more.