Kapellhaus Dormitory in Salzburg
The Kapellhaus is a Medieval building in the Old Town (Altstadt) of Salzburg that was for the longer part of its history home to the choristers of the Salzburger Dom, the "Domkapelle". Today, the Kapellhaus is a Catholic dormitory for Students of Salzburg University and known as a rather alternative one. The building was originally property of the monastery of St. Peter.
In the early 17th century, Prince Archbishop Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau purchased the property to make it a training and living facility not dissimilar from a college. According to an inscription that you can still see alongside with the Kuenburg coat of arms, the Kapellhaus was modernised and adapted by Prince Archbishop Max Gandolf von Kuenburg in 1677. It was home for 16 boys and young men who sang at the cathedral′s services. In return, they received their education free of charge.
Later Story of the Kapellhaus
The Kapellhaus contains a chapel which was equipped with an organ by Prince Archbishop Franz Anton von Harrach in 1723. The boys also had a small garden for recreational purposes, which was located right next to the Edmundsburg. Several famous musicians and composers worked at the Kapellhaus, including Heinrich Ingaz Franz Biber, Michael Haydn (brother of the more famous Joseph), Johann Enst Eberlin, Anton Cajetan Adlgasser or Leopold Mozart (father of Wolfgang Amadeus).
With the secularisation of Salzburg in the course of the Napoleonic Wars, the Kapellhaus was reformed and became something like a music school. Between 1841 and 1880, the predecessor of the Mozarteum was located in the Kapellhaus, alongside with a training facility for teachers. In 1922, the boys choir was dissolved and the Kapellhaus became a dormitory for students of the collage that had once been the old university; only with the re-establishment of the university in the 1960ies, the Kapellhaus became a more diverse place; it is run by the Katholische Hochschulgemeinde, the Catholic Student Association.
Hidden Treasures of Salzburg
Links
http://www2.sbg.ac.at/kapellhaus/
Website of the Kapellhaus
