Joel Urch came into contact with music at an early age in his hometown of Essen: musical home, early musical education, many years of membership in the Essen Cathedral Boys’ Choir, the North Rhine-Westphalia State Youth Choir and the Extra Choir of the Aalto Theater inspired him even in his youth for the wide-ranging expressive possibilities of his voice, but of course also making music together in rehearsals, on concert tours or on the opera stage.
The unifying quality of music, to bring people together and to unite them in a productive exchange process, led him to music at an early age and has lost nothing of its effect for him to this day. The greatest joy is to make music with other people and to meet on a unique level. The genre of song duo unites all these qualities.
Alongside his singing teachers Mechthild Zander, Thomas Körner, Henner Leye and Christoph Prégardien, his companions and sources of inspiration include Stefan Soltesz, Jos van Veldhoven, Marcus Creed, Marc Albrecht, Thomas Laske, Ingeborg Danz, Klesie Kelly-Moog, Thomas Heyer, Roger Vignoles, Michael Gees, Ulrich Eisenlohr and Stefan Irmer. Scenically, he has worked with Dietrich Hilsdorf, Barrie Kosky, Michael Hampe, Andreas Durban, Igor Folwill, Gabriele Rech and Oliver Klöter, among others.
Concert tours have taken him to Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, Austria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, the Czech Republic, Italy, England and China. He studied singing at the HfMT Cologne with Henner Leyhe and Christoph Prégardien, is a scholarship holder of the Richard Wagner Foundation Dortmund chapter and prize winner of the Lions Club Lied Competition 2015.
