Artist Biography Available in: Christoph Schoener (born 1953 in Heidelberg) is a German church musician and university lecturer.
Christoph Schoener studied church music (A-Examen) at the Hochschule für Musik Freiburg, organ with Ludwig Doerr and piano with Carl Seemann and Edith Picht-Axenfeld. He supplemented his education as a scholarship holder of the German National Academic Foundation by teaching Gaston Litaize at the Conservatoire à rayonnement régional de Saint-Maur-des-Fossés, which he completed with a first prize ("Priest Prix a l'unanimité"). Later he took lessons with Ewald Kooiman in Amsterdam. From 1984 to 1998 he worked as a cantor and organist at the Bielertkirche in Opladen. He directed the Leverkusen Bach Choir. The Evangelical Church in the Rhineland appointed him in 1991 as successor of as Provincial Church Music Director (LKMD) (together with Volker Ebers). In 1996, he retired from LKMD. In February 1998, he succeeded Günter Jena's church music director at the Hamburg main church of St. Michael. In a very short time he founded the choir St. Michaelis.
In 2004 he took over the artistic direction of the 79th. Bachfests of the Neues Bachgesellschaft in Hamburg. From the winter semester 2013/14, he had a lectureship at the University of Music and Theatre "Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy" Leipzig for four semesters. He was awarded the honorary title of professor by the Hamburg Senate in 2018. In December 2019, he went as a cantor at the main church of St. Michaelis retires. His successor was granted the first one. January 2020 Jörg Endebrock.
His repertoire focuses on the complete work of Johann Sebastian Bach and Deutsche Romantik. In 2016, he was honoured with Echo Klassik for the recording of all organ toccats by Bach in the category "Audiophile Multi-Channel Recording of the Year" for interpretation and sound.