16.06.2026
A Life Dedicated to Choral Music: Carus Founder Günter Graulich turns 100
On July 2, 2026, Günter Graulich, founder of Carus-Verlag, will celebrate his 100th birthday. As a publisher, church musician, conductor and educator, he has had unparalleled influence upon the cultivation and dissemination of vocal music, creating a life’s work that extends far beyond Stuttgart.
What began in 1972 as a small publishing venture founded with his wife Waltraud has grown into an internationally renowned name in choral music: Carus-Verlag in Stuttgart. Günter Graulich laid the foundation for a publishing house uniquely dedicated to vocal music from the Baroque era to the present day.
Yet Graulich was never merely a publisher behind the scenes. Alongside his editorial work he remained an active church musician and conductor. For decades he served as the cantor at Stuttgart’s Matthäuskirche, and he also led the Motettenchor Stuttgart for more than fifty years. He produced numerous recordings with his ensemble and toured extensively throughout Europe and the United States.
His particular achievement lies in the rediscovery and editorial preparation of great choral music. Graulich published multiple works from the Baroque, Viennese Classical, and Romantic periods, setting new standards for the quality of these editions. The fact that the sacred choral music of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy and Heinrich Schütz, as well as the oeuvre of Josef Gabriel Rheinberger, are now widely established in the concert repertoire is due in no small part to him: he made many of these works accessible for the first time in modern editions published by Carus.
In recognition of his lifetime achievements Günter Graulich has received numerous honors, including the honorary German title of Director of Church Music (DKM) and the Federal Cross of Merit, First Class.
Günter Graulich lives in Stuttgart with his wife Waltraud. Carus Verlag remains a family-owned company and is now led by their youngest son, Dr. Johannes Graulich.
Dr. Johannes Graulich: “Carus Verlag honors its founder with deep gratitude, and proudly embraces its mission to carry his musical vision into the future.”
27.09.2022
International Heinrich-Schütz-Price for Carus and Bärenreiter
The organizers of the
Heinrich Schütz Music Festival yesterday announced that the 2022
International Heinrich Schütz Prize will go to the publishing houses
Carus and Bärenreiter. The director of the Heinrich Schütz Music
Festival, Dr. Christina Siegfried, explained
the decision for this year's prize winners: "The two publishing houses -
the Bärenreiter-Verlag Kassel and the Carus-Verlag Stuttgart - have
been facing a mammoth task under the sign of Sagittarius in a special
way for decades. Their work is the basis for
scholarship and music-making practice. In the SCHÜTZ22 festival year,
the appropriate moment seems to have come to honor this outstanding
achievement".
The award ceremony will take place on October 16, 2022 in Torgau, Saxony.
12.01.2022
50 years of Carus – 500 years of choral music: Carus-Verlag celebrates landmark anniversary
Carus-Verlag will be 50 years old! In 1972 choral director Günter Graulich and his wife Waltraud Graulich founded Carus-Verlag and published Antonio Vivaldi’s “Gloria in D” RV 589 for choir and orchestra as their first edition – the first scholarly-critical music edition of this masterpiece. Today the catalog of this medium-sized publisher contains around 45,000 works – largely vocal – from five centuries of the European choral tradition, and in addition, books, CDs and apps. The edition of the “Gloria” has remained a bestseller in the Carus program.
free press photo Carus-Verlag (Copyright: Carus-Verlag / Sven-Cichowicz)
free press photo Waltraud and Günter Graulich (Copyright: Carus-Verlag)
free press photo Dr. Johannes Graulich and Ester Petri (Copyright: Carus-Verlag / Nadine Kristen)
free press photo Dr. Johannes Graulich (Copyright: Carus-Verlag / Sven-Cichowicz)
free press photo Ester Petri (Copyright: Carus-Verlag / Sven-Cichowicz)