This is Bel Canto Choir Vilnius. The No. 1 choir in Lithuania
Bel Canto Choir Vilnius is Lithuania’s best mixed independent choir, uniting more than 50 singers who are deeply passionate about music and choral singing. We perform music in various styles, regularly collaborate with world-class musicians, and participate in competitions and festivals in Lithuania and abroad.
Our mission is bold: We aim to revolutionize choral music and make its beauty and charm accessible to all. We are committed to continuous development and aspire to be Lithuania’s most innovative, transparent, and renowned choir and to secure our place among Europe’s elite choirs.
Yet, we are more than just a choir. We are a vibrant community of talented and ambitious individuals bound by their shared love for music. This bond extends beyond the stage, fostering a unique sense of belonging and camaraderie. We take pride in being the most admired choir by our team members and audience.
In 2023, we achieved a remarkable feat, clinching first place at the Lithuanian National Choral Competition finals and retaining the title of the country’s best volunteer choir. An international panel of judges awarded us an impressive 96.3 points – the highest among all choirs in Lithuania. This marked our third consecutive triumph, following their previous victories in 2013 and 2017.
We also won the Stasys Šimkus International Choral Competition in Klaipėda, Lithuania (2013), Grand Prix at the InCanto Mediterraneo Choral Competition in Italy (2019), were awarded a gold medal at the World Choir Games (2014), participated in prestigious choral competitions in Busan (South Korea), Tolosa, Torrevieja (Spain) and elsewhere.
Open To The World
In 2018, we launched our flagship choral-vocal music project, Open To The World. The project aims to showcase modern choral music, promote Western culture, and foster exchanges with the world’s best choirs, vocal ensembles, and composers.
To date, the festival has staged 21 concerts, featuring some of the world’s most renowned artists, including contemporary composers and Grammy winners Christopher Tin and Eric Whitacre (USA), Ola Gjeilo (USA/Norway), top Swedish choirs Zero8, Svanholm Singers, and Sofia Vokalensemble, the best British vocal ensemble Voces8 and choir The Sixteen (UK), Sweden’s top groups The Real Group, Ringmasters, and Lemon Squeezy, as well as Lithuania’s premier boys choir Dagilėlis, the Ąžuoliukas choir, the vocal ensemble Duodeco, and other performers from Lithuania, Norway, and Switzerland.
OTTW concerts have attracted a total of 10,800 attendees. Many performances have been published on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Music, with the choir’s videos receiving over 2.3M views annually. Some concerts have also been broadcast on LRT, Lithuania’s public broadcaster.
What We Are Proud Of: Our Major Achievements
2024
OTTW with Christopher Tin, LVSO, The Real Group & Friends
Our Open To The World festival reached a significant milestone this year. It united 235 singers and musicians from Lithuania, the USA, Sweden, Norway, and the UK, attracting a record audience of 3,608 attendees.
OTTW ’24 featured our historic collaboration with Christopher Tin, one of the world’s most celebrated concert and video game music composers, and a two-time Grammy Award winner. This marked Tin’s first-ever performance in the Baltics and Nordics.
In addition, the festival featured the Lithuanian State Symphony Orchestra, vocal ensembles The Real Group (SE) and Duodeco (LT), choirs A Scalpella (SE) and Dagilėlis (LT), the barbershop quartet Lemon Squeezy (SE), soloists Jamal Moore (USA), Tomas Pavilionis, Marius Beck (Norway), Lina Dambrauskaitė, Maori haka performers Roimata Kautai and Aritaku Robens, and others.
2023
OTTW with Zero8, Ringmasters, Voces8 & Dagilėlis
Our highly successful Open To The World project was transformed into Vilnius’s first vocal music festival. From December 1 to 10, audiences enjoyed five sold-out concerts at St. Catherine’s Church and the Lithuanian National Philharmonic, featuring exclusive guests: Voces8, the Grammy-nominated British vocal ensemble; Zero8, Sweden’s best male voice choir; Ringmasters, the world championship-winning barbershop quartet; Dagilėlis, Lithuania’s best boys choir; and Marius Beck, a Norwegian vocalist and guitarist.
OTTW ’23 united 170 singers and musicians, attracting a record audience of 2,056 attendees.
2023
Lithuania’s Best, Again!
For the third consecutive time, we have secured the title of Lithuania’s highest-ranked choir. We emerged victorious in Lithuania’s premier choral competition, solidifying our position as the leading choir in the nation. A panel of judges awarded us 96.3 points, the highest score among Lithuanian choirs, earning us first place. The girls’ choir “Virgo” (94 points) and the Klaipėda mixed choir “Cantare” (92 points) also made it to the top three list of choirs with the highest ratings.
2023
Our First LP
We released the first-ever vinyl of modern choral music in Lithuania. It features works by renowned contemporary composers such as Eric Whitacre and Ola Gjeilo and popular music specially arranged for the choir.
A special highlight of the vinyl is the song “In Bloom” by Kurt Cobain, the leader of the legendary US band Nirvana. We worked with young Swedish composer Henrik Dahlgren to create a unique arrangement of this grunge track.
2022
Open To The World with Zero8
An exclusive sold-out evening in Vilnius – the concert of our Open to the World project together with Zero8, one of Sweden’s most popular male choirs. On November 27, we performed a stylistically diverse and unique musical program with our Swedish friends at Vilnius Philharmonic. Over 770 people attended the concert.
2021
Open To The World with Voces8
We continued our Open to the World project with the world-renowned British vocal ensemble Voces8. Together, we presented two sold-out Christmas shows on December 4-5, 2021, at St. Catherine’s Church in Vilnius, with over 660 spectators in attendance.
2021
Studio Album OTTW
Open to the World, our first studio album was recorded at the Paliesius Manor in November 2021. We have chosen some wonderful contemporary choral pieces and are happy to have our long-time friends joining us: the Mettis String Quartet, cellist Augustas Gocentas, pianist Motiejus Bazaras, and Norwegian singer-songwriter Marius Beck.
The album was sponsored by the Lithuanian Council for Culture, and the Lithuanian Neighboring Rights Association AGATA and recorded by Grammy-nominated recording producer Vilius Keras and his team at Baltic Mobile Recordings. The album is available on Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, and YouTube.
2020
Pause & Refresh
2020 was a year like no other for everyone. Due to the worldwide pandemic, we had to postpone our concerts and joint projects with wonderful singers and performers. However, this temporary break gave us the chance to refresh, do our homework, and make plans and preparations for the future.
This year we published quite a few live recordings of our previous concerts. The live album “Together in Vilnius” and the single “Fly to Paradise” are available on Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music and YouTube.
2019
Our 10-Year Journey Together
At the end of 2019, we celebrated our 10-year birthday by holding two sold-out concerts at St Catherine’s Church in Vilnius. The concerts, called 10 Christmases Together, were attended by more than 830 people.
Bel Canto Choir Vilnius was founded by a group of passionate choristers in 2009 and enjoyed impressive achievements in just ten years since then. Among these are two consecutive victories at the Lithuanian National Choral Competition, entries in Lithuania’s record books, and concerts with world-renowned stars of choral music. We appeared onstage with Grammy-winner and the world’s most popular contemporary composer and conductor Eric Whitacre, one of the world’s most famous composers Ola Gjeilo, superstar UK vocal ensemble Voces8, world-renowned choir The Sixteen, as well as other great choirs.
2019
At Prestigious Tolosa Choral Contest
In fall 2019, we took part in the prestigious Tolosa International Choral Competition in the Basque province of Gipuzkoa, northern Spain. The contest is part of the European Grand Prix for Choral Singing, the best-known and most prestigious network of choral contests in Europe.
We competed in the polyphonic and folk/pop music categories and received a combined rating of 8.1 points (81 percent) out of 10 (100 percent). We were invited to participate in this prestigious European contest for the second time.
2018
Open To The World
We launched Open To The World with a 7-concert series, dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the Restoration of Lithuania’s Independence. We performed together with two of the world’s most popular contemporary composers, Eric Whitacre and Ola Gjeilo, Sweden’s best choirs Svanholm Singers and Sofia Vokalensemble, the elite vocal ensemble Voces8 (UK), and Swiss choir Männerstimmen Basel. The project aimed to present the world’s best to Lithuanian audiences, to create, innovate, learn, and improve. Together.
Our OTTW ’18 reached a record audience. It attracted 3,500 concertgoers, while information about the project reached hundreds of thousands in Lithuania and abroad.
2017
The Best in Lithuania
On October 15, 2017, we took first place in the finals of the Lithuanian National Choral Competition, securing the title of the best volunteer choir in Lithuania for the next four years.
An international panel of judges awarded us 98 points – the highest among all choirs in Lithuania. We also won the competition’s Grand Prix.
2017
The First Virtual Reality 360 Video
In July 2017, we premiered our first Virtual 360° Video, which is also the first one in the history of Lithuania’s choral music. We have chosen a beautiful ‘Lux Aurumque’ by Eric Whitacre for the premiere. The performance of the piece was filmed and recorded live in December 2016 at our Revolution Together concert, featuring Eric Whitacre himself.
2016
Revolution Together with Eric Whitacre
For the first time, Eric Whitacre – a rock star of the global choral scene, Grammy winner, TED speaker, and one of the most famous composers and conductors of his generation – joined forces with our choir for a special concert entitled “Revolution Together.” On December 11-12, 2016, at the Lithuanian National Philharmonic in Vilnius, we performed together with Eric, marking a historic moment in Lithuanian choral music.
2016
At the Tolosa Choral Competition
In October 2016, we performed at the Tolosa International Choral Competition in Tolosa, the Basque region of Spain. This contest belongs to the European Grand Prix for Choral Singing, the major and the most prestigious A-level network of choral contests in Europe.
We received 8.1 points (81.2 percent) out of 10 (100 percent) in the highly competitive and complex polyphonic music category. Choir Brevis, another Lithuanian choir that participated in the contest, received the same number of points.
2016
Setting a Lithuanian Record!
We have earned a place in the national record book. This was reported on June 3, 2016, by Factum, an agency that records Lithuanian records.
We joined the national list of achievements by holding “the longest choral concert tour held on a single stage” in the history of Lithuania. Late in 2015, we performed for three consecutive nights at the Lithuanian National Philharmonic Hall and our three sold-out concerts attracted audiences totaling almost 2 000 people.
2015
At the EXPO 2015 in Italy
Our choir and Vilnius City Municipality’s St. Christopher Chamber Orchestra represented Lithuania at Expo 2015 in Milan, Italy. We and the Orchestra performed at the key event of Lithuania’s National Day at this International Exposition. The performance took place at the Expo 2015 major concert hall, which accommodated more than 1,000 spectators.
2014
Club of the World’s Best
In July 2014, we joined the ranks of the world’s best choirs. At the World Choir Games 2014, held in Riga, Latvia, we received 90.63 points and won the gold medal. Gold medals at the Choir Games are awarded to choirs that score between 80 and 100 points. This was our first appearance at the World Choir Games, where we competed in the Contemporary Music category in the Champions Competition.
2014
Our Debut on iTunes, Spotify & Amazon
In the spring of 2014, we became the first Lithuanian choir to publish its music on iTunes, Spotify, and Amazon.
2013
The Best Choir in Lithuania
In December 2013, we rocked the country’s choral music scene and accomplished the unthinkable. During the fourth year of our existence, we won Lithuania’s major National Choral Competition, thus becoming the best volunteer choir in the country. We triumphed at the competition winning first place (92.2 points) in the mixed choirs category. Lithuania’s National Choral Competition is being organized every four years by the Lithuanian Choral Union and is aimed to assess the artistic level of the choirs and to select the best ones in the country.
2013
Our Triumph in Klaipėda
In November 2013, we shone at the Stasys Šimkus International Choral Competition in Klaipėda, Lithuania. The international jury of the Competition, which is considered one of the most prestigious in the Baltics, awarded us first place (91.2 points) in the mixed choirs category. Moreover, we received two special prizes – for the best performance of the mandatory song and the best performance of the song by a Lithuanian composer.
2011
Our Debut on YouTube
In spring 2011, we became the first among Lithuanian choirs to introduce its official YouTube channel.