composer

b. 1943
Christian Ridil, born in Breslau in 1943, received a thorough education and musical training (piano, violin, singing, harmony) at the Re-gensburger Domspatzen music school. After graduating from high school, he studied school music and composition with Günter Bialas at the University of Music and Performing Arts Munich and musicology at the University of Augsburg.

After fourteen years of teaching at a grammar school in Neusäß/Augsburg, Christian Ridil was appointed to the Goethe University in Frankfurt/Main. There he taught at the Institute of Musicology until his retirement in 2011 and directed the university's own choirs and orchestras. In the 1992/93 academic year, Ridil taught as an exchange professor at Trenton State College, New Jersey (USA). He was appointed University Music Director in 1994 and received an honorary doctorate in 2010.

Ridil has been awarded numerous prizes for his extensive compositional output. It also includes several commissioned works such as Psalm 23 from 2008 on the occasion of Cardinal Lehmann's 25th anniversary as bishop of Mainz. Ridil's orchestral and chamber music works are performed in Germany and abroad, including by members of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Ensemble Modern, the Frankfurt Opera House and Museum Orchestra, the Leipzig Symphony Orchestra and the National Symphony Orchestra of Polish Radio.
Ridil's choral works are part of the repertoire of many vocal ensembles. His motets, choral cantatas and secular vocal music are performed by the cathedral choirs in Mainz and Regensburg and the choir of the Dresden University of Church Music, among others. At the German Choir Competition 2023, the jury selected a work for male choir by Ridil as a compulsory piece.

Since 2013, a series of CD recordings with a selection of Christian Ridil's works have been made, including organ music, sacred and secular choral music with the choir of the Dresden University of Church Music under the direction of Stephan Lennig; a CD with male choirs and solo songs with the Camerata Musica Limburg under Jan Schumacher was released by GENUIN classics. Musicians from the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra recorded chamber music on the same label in 2021. Volume 2 of chamber music followed in 2022, including the string quartet “Sisifo”, which was interpreted by the Eliot Quartet. In the fall of 2024, orchestral music by Christian Ridil with the Leipzig Symphony Orchestra was released, including the Bassoon Concerto - soloist Rainer Seidel - and the Flute Concerto - soloist Jens Josef - as well as the first recording of the 1st Symphony. Robbert van Steijn conducted the recordings. In 2025, the Ensemble modern will complete the chamber music.

Photo: Samira Schulz

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