The Serbian Radio and Television Choir was founded in 1939 within Radio Belgrade. The first chief-conductor, Milan Bajšanski, directed the program strategy towards the affirmation of the domestic musical heritage, as well as significant pieces of world choral literature and vocal-instrumental works. It has been maintained to this day, defining the artistic biography of this ensemble that has lasted for eight decades. The work of the Choir has been particularly marked by the chief-conductors Borivoje Simić, Mladen Jagušt, Vladimir Kranjčević, Bojan Suđić and Srboljub Dinić, who has been the Artistic Director of this ensemble since 2025.
Throughout its history, the Choir has performed with many prominent conductors and soloists. It has participated in all major music festivals in Yugoslavia and Serbia, and has also had successful tours in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey, England, France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Spain, Italy, Greece and Russia. The choir is also continuously active in the field of archiving permanent sound recordings, which are kept in the Sound Archive of Radio Belgrade. Among them, the music of domestic creators stands out, thereby this ensemble actively works towards the preservation and affirmation of national cultural heritage.
As the only professional ensemble of this type in Serbia, the Choir cultivates a repertoire that includes the most significant works of choral literature and complex scores of vocal-instrumental and opera music, and also cultivates music of popular genres. It actively performs works by contemporary foreign and domestic authors, most often interpreting them for the first time, and many of them are dedicated to it. The repertoire continues to expand in the form of cooperation with other ensembles of the RTS Music Production, enriching the already rich collection of the Sound Archive with new, interpretatively modernized recordings. The wide range of artistic aspirations has positioned the RTS Choir as a renowned choral ensemble, with a recognizable sound and performing reputation, which is actively present in Serbian musical life.
Among the numerous awards, the following stand out: the October Award of the City of Belgrade (1982), the Golden Link (1989) for the advancement of culture and art in the city of Belgrade, the Golden Link (2007) for a lasting contribution to the culture of the capital city, the Musica Classica for the concert of the year (2014) and the Sretenje Order of the third degree, for the results achieved in cultural activities in 80 years of work (2019).
Hadži Jakov Milutinović graduated from the Conducting Department of the Faculty of Music in Belgrade, in the class of Prof. Bojan Suđić. In his previous conducting work, he has collaborated in concerts with the RTS Symphony Orchestra, the State Philharmonic of the Republic of North Macedonia, the AEMоD Stanislav Binički Symphony Orchestra, the RTS Choir, the Kolibri Children’s Choir, the Branko NCPD, and the Mixed Choir of the Faculty of Arts in Niš. He has assisted notable conductors, including Charles Dutoit, Bojan Suđić, Gabriel Feltz, Srboljub Dinić, Aleksandar Marković, Mark Korović, and Michelangelo Mazza, and has attended conducting courses with Alexei Zhukov (Russia), Irina Denisova (Belarus) and Peter Jermikhov (USA). In 2020, he began his collaboration with the RTS Choir, which continues to this day, and through which he has achieved several notable concert performances, recordings and authorial projects, with a special focus on domestic and international contemporary compositional practice. He participated as a choir conductor in the opera productions of the Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra – Tosca (2023) and Madame Butterfly (2024). He is also actively involved in composing. His works are performed in India, Russia, Belarus, Israel, Great Britain, Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Germany, Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Greece and Serbia. He is a melographer of Serbian folk church singing and one of the authors of the anthology Serbian Folk Church Singing: Holiday Songs in the Singing of the Sisterhood of the Ravanica Monastery. He is a finalist of the International Competition of Christian Music Composers in Moscow in 2021, winner of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts Award for exceptional results in 2018, and a commendation from the Royal House of Karađorđević.