Director
Fritz Näf
Fritz Näf, founder and director of the Basler Madrigalisten and the Swiss Chamber Choir, studied voice at the conservatories in Zurich and Freiburg i. Brsg. and attended master classes, among others, given by Jenny Tourel (New York) and Ernst Häfliger (Munich). He performed as tenor throughout Europe and later continued his studies to become a choral and orchestra conductor.
From 1976 to 1986 he taught voice and vocal ensemble at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, where he founded the Basler Madrigalisten in 1978.Between 1986 and 2000 he was, successively, director of the Conservatory (Musikhochschule) in Winterthur and then headmaster of the newly established Zurich Conservatory of Music and Drama (Hochschule Musik und Theater Zürich). In 1997, in collaboration with the Tonhalle Orchestra of Zurich, he founded the Swiss Chamber Choir.
Since December 2000 he has been full-time artistic director of the Swiss Chamber Choir and the Basler Madrigalisten and has been guest conductor of, among others, Radio della Svizzera Italiana Lugano, Chœur de Radio France, Orchestra of the Musikkollegium Winterthur, Baroque orchestras such as the Concerto Köln and L’arpa festante Munich, Les Cornets Noirs or Neue Düsseldorfer Hofmusik).
