Univ.-Prof. Mag.art. Alois Glaßner
Choral conducting
Webern Chamber Choir
Alois Glaßner is one of Austria's most prominent choir conductors. He received his musical training at the then University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna, studying organ, church music, composition, conducting and vocal pedagogy. Guest studies took him to Stockholm with Eric Ericson and to London. While he was still a student, he founded the Hugo Distler Choir Vienna and, in the ten years of its existence, made this ensemble one of the country's outstanding concert choirs. From 1992 to 2005, he was church music director at the Augustinerkirche in Vienna, which is known for its church music tradition. From 2003 to 2020, Alois Glaßner directed the Bachchor Salzburg, which he helped to gain international renown through consistent musical work. Under his leadership, the choir became a permanent artistic partner of the major Salzburg festivals, where it enjoyed success in numerous concerts and in a number of stage productions.
As a conductor, Alois Glaßner has conducted the Vienna Volksoper Symphony Orchestra, the Mozarteum Orchestra and the Camerata Salzburg, among others. Guest conducting engagements have taken him to numerous European countries and overseas. He is also active internationally as a juror and lecturer at various master classes.
Glaßner has been teaching at the mdw since 1991, initially as part of the music education studies. In 2004 he was appointed Professor of Conducting at the Anton Bruckner Institute of the mdw, and in 2018 he moved to the Institute of Music Conducting, where he took over the teaching of choral conducting and currently also heads the institute.
Alois Glaßner also directs the Webern Chamber Choir of the mdw, with which he performs a lively concert schedule and seeks encounters and exchanges with partner universities and their choirs from all over the world in the “Choral Bridges” series.