[1][2] Born in Basel into a prosperous family, Heinz Spörli was exposed to theater arts at an early age, thanks to the enthusiasm of his father.
At age 17, he began taking ballet classes with Walter Kleiber, a well-known local teacher, while continuing his formal education.
Despite his late start, Spoerli advanced rapidly in his dance training, and in 1960, at age 19, he was engaged as an artist of the Basel Municipal Theater, directed by Vaslav Orlikovsky.
There he was exposed to an international repertory of high caliber, including works of Balanchine, Béjart, Cranko, de Mille, and Lander.
The large roster of dancers in this company allowed him to mount productions on a grander scale than had been possible in Basel, and he took full advantage of the opportunity, creating some of his most memorable works during his sojourn in Germany.
[8] Over the years, Spoerli also worked as guest choreographer for dance companies in many cities of Europe and Asia, including Paris, Berlin, Frankfurt, Stuttgart, Milan, Budapest, Vienna, Graz, Lisbon, Stockholm, Oslo, Helsinki, Hong Kong, and Singapore.
Performed by his own companies, his ballets have also been seen in the United States, England, Scotland, the Netherlands, Spain, Greece, Egypt, Israel, Poland, Russia, South Africa, Japan, China, Taiwan, and Thailand.
For his third version of A Midsummer Night's Dream (1994), Spoerli supplemented the familiar music of Mendelssohn-Bartholdy with contemporary compositions by Philip Glass and Steve Reich, and for the fourth version, in 1996, he enhanced the confusion of identities and the senses at the heart of the plot by adding actors from the Royal Shakespeare Company as stagehands who interrupt the action, leaving audiences to wonder just what kind of innovative dance-theater piece they had witnessed.
Among them are Goldberg Variations, In den Winden im Nichts ("Winds in the Void"), and Wäre heute morgen und gestern jetzt ("if today were tomorrow and yesterday now"), all set to music by Bach.
Periodically, the foundation makes substantial cash awards to outstanding choreographers and dancers and contributes to educational programs designed to foster public interest in dance.
In 2013, Spoerli donated his personal papers and theatrical memorabilia to the Paul Sacher Foundation, an archive and research center for the music of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.
Located in Münsterplatz, in the heart of Basel, the foundation's library contains holdings of materials from many Swiss composers and musicians as well as figures such as Stravinsky, Bartók, Berio, Boulez, Carter, and others of international renown.