During his third year of music-education studies at the
Cologne Conservatory, free stylistic exercises in composition were part of the programme of training. His teacher was
Hermann Schroeder. Along with fugues, chorale preludes, sonatas, and song arrangements in various traditional styles, and a scherzo in the style of
Paul Hindemith, Stockhausen wrote a number of choral pieces for the school choir in which he himself sang: The "Madrigalchor der Kölner Musikhochschule" was conducted by Schroeder, and the first performance took place in a recording for
Cologne Conservatory,
Cologne (WDR) in 1950. Amongst them was "Choral", with a text written by Stockhausen beginning "Wer uns trug mit Schmerzen in dies Leben" (Who has borne us with pain in this life). Stockhausen, who had not considered himself a composer up to this point, decided shortly after finishing this and the
Chöre für Doris to attempt something a little more ambitious for the first time, and wrote the
Drei Lieder for alto voice and chamber orchestra. All of these student works and a number of later ones remained unpublished until 1971, when Stockhausen rediscovered his early work
Formel for chamber orchestra, and noticed affinities with his then-just-completed
Mantra for two pianos and electronics. When
Maurice Fleuret asked for a new piece to be performed at the Journées de Musique Contemporaine, Stockhausen offered
Formel, and filled out the programme with a selection of other early compositions, including the
Drei Lieder and the
Sonatine for violin and piano. On this same programme, on 21 October 1971 at the
Théâtre de la Ville in Paris,
Marcel Couraud's chamber choir sang the
Chöre für Doris for the first time, together with the contemporaneous "Choral". ==Analysis==