The Vienna Boys Choir has received an emergency 800,000 Euros grant to cover rising inflationary costs and a collapse in sponsorship.
The ‘acute aid’ was sneaked through during the holidays break.
Two-thirds of the boys’ income is derived from international tours.
More here.
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“Sneaked through” if it were in the context of the UK would mean a cut in aid rather than the opposite.
Having arranged several tours with the Vienna Boys Choir more than 30 years ago, I was always surprised that the basic fee was so relatively low, given the always full houses. With three Choirs touring for much of each year, the potential for generating plenty of revenue was definitely there and fees could have been higher.
But I could never understand why fees then had to be paid in US$ cash. It was only when the Choir’s director was later ‘relieved’ of his position that I assumed some of those fees had gone missing.
The one aspect of the concerts which I never enjoyed was the short opera stuck in the middle. It seemed unnatural and some at least of the boys always looked self-conscious! But that was then and I do not know the present situation. Running a major educational institution as well as organizing tours will inevitably be expensive. But if the Choir tours are as popular as they once were, I fail to understand how it can not pay its own way, or indeed why sponsorship around the world is no longer attractive.
Thanks Nick, this is very interesting information and it raises some puzzling questions that I hope can be answered. In the 1960s, I well remember the excitement that the appearance of the boys created at the Philharmonic Hall in Liverpool.
This is good news as the Wiener Sängerknaben is an important national/cultural asset with a long and distinguished history.
Times have changed and perhaps this type of entertainment is no longer interesting to the public at large, especially young people no matter how talented the choir is.