The Canticum Novum Foundation for the Development of College Choral Art was established in 1992 by the member students in order to help the work of the Canticum Novum Chamer Choir. The aim of the foundation and the choir is to contribute to the receptive and widening Hungarian teacher training, making it adequate to the international standard. In this way it enhances the reputation of Hungarian music education and enriches the culture of Debrecen.

The Canticum Novum Chamber Choir was established in 1989 in Debrecen, its conductor is Ágnes Török, the associate professor of the Music Faculty of Debrecen University. The members of the choir are mostly college and university students, young music teachers but for some years Finn, American and Norwegian undergraduates studying at Debrecen University also have taken part in the work of the choir. At present the choir has 24 members.

The endeavour of the Canticum Novum Chamber Choir is to sing pieces of music which are performed on-stage very rarely. For instance they have already reproduced several times the opera of Dido and Aeneas by H. Purcell and his Te Deum, Via Crucis by F. Liszt, works by A. Gabrieli etc...

In addition to old masters’ compositions, the members of the choir feel that their first-rate vocation is to make the audience get to know the contemporary Hungarian pieces of music.Some references of the latest choral works were written directly to the Chamber Choir. The chorus made a CD anthology based on the choral pieces of the Kossuth- prized János Vajda between 1999 and 2000.

The Chamber Choir serves regularly as a practice choir as well: it is one of the degree choirs of the students majoring in choral conducting at university faculty and it participates in the degree concerts of the students majoring in composition at the Ferenc Liszt University.