Before we start the year 2024, we would like to take a look back with you at the last few months and the highlights at the Bayerische Staatsoper. Let us reminisce and relive past moments. Have fun with our review of the year!
#BSO500 #BSOontour
The Bayerische Staatsorchester celebrated its 500th anniversary this year, making it one of the oldest and most traditional ensembles in the world. Based in the Bayerische Staatsoper, the orchestra and its 144 members perform both in the orchestra pit and on the concert platform. In 2023, the orchestra was voted "Orchestra of the Year" for the ninth time in a row in the critics' survey conducted by Opernwelt magazine and was also honoured at the Grammophone Awards in London in 2022 for its recordings on the Bayerische Staatsoper Recordings label as an opera and symphony orchestra (for Die tote Stadt and The Snow Queen as well as for Mahler's Symphony No. 7) - an unprecedented success in the history of the Grammophone Awards.
The creative team around director Krzysztof Warlikowski has enjoyed many years of successful collaboration, which has taken them to all of Europe's major opera houses. At the Bayerische Staatsoper, the team last staged Salome in almost the same constellation in 2019.
For the double bill Dido and Aeneas ... Erwartung, Małgorzata Szczęśniak once again designed the stage and costumes, as she has done for all of Warlikowski's productions since 1992. Dramaturge Christian Longchamp, who has worked with the team on numerous projects at other theatres, was working in Munich for the first time.
Warlikowski is also associated with the singer who created both roles, Dido and the Woman, Aušrinė Stundytė. Together they celebrated a great success at the Salzburg Festival in 2020 with Elektra. The singer has been a regular guest in Munich since 2015 and was last seen in 2021 as Regan in Reimann's Lear and in 2022 as Jeanne in Krzysztof Penderecki's The Devils of Loudun.
#BSOako
In the anniversary year, the predecessors of the current General Music Director were invited to conduct their former orchestra; Zubin Mehta kicked things off this season, returning to the podium in the 4th Academy Concert with Anton Bruckner's Seventh Symphony. He also accompanied the phenomenal violinist Vilde Frang, who performed Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy's E minor Concerto and premiered another commissioned work by a composer closely associated with the Bayerische Staatsoper: Minas Borboudakis wrote a new piece for the Bayerische Staatsorchester.
![[Translate to English:] 4. AKADEMIEKONZERT](/media/_processed_/8/d/csm_4._Akademiekonzert_2023_Minas_Borboudakis_Zubin_Mehta_c_W.Hoesl_eab145b1e1.jpg "[Translate to English:] 4. AKADEMIEKONZERT")
![[Translate to English:] 4. AKADEMIEKONZERT](/media/_processed_/1/7/csm_4._Akademiekonzert_2023_c_W.Hoesl_87b225649f.jpg "[Translate to English:] 4. AKADEMIEKONZERT")
![[Translate to English:] 4. AKADEMIEKONZERT](/media/_processed_/d/3/csm_4._Akademiekonzert_2023_c_W.Hoesl__3__194df16f50.jpg "[Translate to English:] 4. AKADEMIEKONZERT")
#BSOkriegundfrieden
A powerful work that goes beyond all bounds: Sergei S. Prokofiev's monumental setting of Lew N. Tolstoy's monumental novel War and Peace. The composer and his wife Mira have condensed the plot, which takes place during Napoleon's campaign in Russia, into a powerful sequence of scenes in which the love story between Natasha Rostova and Andrei Bolkonsky and the depiction of the Russian army's battle against the French invasion alternate in rich contrast and are at the same time closely interwoven. How the arrogance of the old, ossified nobility stands in the way of the happiness of two young people, how a seduction succeeds and a kidnapping fails, how some renounce their love and others fall as heroes - and how people search for a counterpart amidst all the splendour: this is what the music tells in its full abundance of magnificent themes and touchingly quiet moments. In its 13 scenes, Prokofiev's major musico-dramatic work combines social drama and historical chronicle to create an exuberant panorama.
This opera was performed in Munich for the first time ever.
The opera War and Peace was honoured with several awards:
The production was honoured as "Performance of the Year" in the critics' poll of the trade journal Opernwelt. Director Dmitri Tcherniakov also received the "Director of the Year" award.
The production was also honoured as "New Production of the Year" at the International Opera Awards.
#BSO500
A special premiere was on the programme for the Bayerische Staatsorchesters anniversary year: for the first time, the orchestra played in Munich's youngest concert hall and made a guest appearance at the Isarphilharmonie in HP8.
#BSBschmetterling
On 31 March 2023, works by the choreographer duo León/Lightfoot were performed for the first time at the Bayerisches Staatsballett. The two-part ballet evening Schmetterling combines two works by Sol León and Paul Lightfoot, Silent Screen and Schmetterling, which are among the defining works of their oeuvre. Together, they have created more than 60 world premieres for the Nederlands Dans Theater (NDT). Silent Screen and Schmetterling were performed for the first time in this double bill combination. Schmetterling opened the ballet festival week at the National Theatre to thunderous applause on 31.3.23.
In spring, the Bayerische Staatsballett traditionally organises the Ballet Festival Week. Founded in 1960 by the then ballet director Heinz Rosen, the festival showed the highlights of the current season at the Nationaltheater between 31 March and 8 April 2023. The festival kicked off with the premiere evening of Schmetterling. The festival programme was complemented by the story ballets A Midsummer Night's Dream by John Neumeier, Romeo and Juliet by John Cranko and Cinderella by Christopher Wheeldon, as well as the multi-part evenings Passagen with works by David Dawson, Alexei Ratmansky, Marco Goecke and Tchaikovsky-Overtures by Alexei Ratmansky.
#BSOjamai
The festival for early and contemporary music theatre.
In 2023, the Ja, Mai Festival was all about Toshio Hosokawa's and Claudio Monteverdi's music and once again brought together places of artistic creation and different art forms.
The second edition of the Ja, Mai Festival, newly founded by the Bayerische Staatsoper, focused on synergies between music theatre, dance and the visual arts and revolved around the theme of "expectation". The festival explored themes such as waiting, the passing of time, the question of letting go or holding on and the various semantic dimensions of time.
#BSOhanjo
Belgian choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui has already staged two French operas (Rameau's Les Indes galantes and Gluck's Alceste) at the Bayerische Staatsoper. Together with dancers from his company Eastman, he worked on Toshio Hosokawa's opera Hanjo as part of the Ja, Mai festival, devoting himself to a cultural world into which he had already immersed himself in earlier works. In TeZuka, for example, he focussed on Japanese manga by the artist Osamu TeZuka. In general, he is driven by an intercultural interest, for example in the Chinese Shaolin in his successful play Sutra or the communication between cultures in Babel (words). For Hanjo, Cherkaoui collaborated with the Thai artist Rirkrit Tiravanija, whose works move between visual and performance art, examine cultural and political action or - as in his cookery performances - create a meeting place themselves. Hanjo's musical director was Lothar Koenigs, who conducted the Bayerische Staatsorchester in Munich with his Strauss repertoire as well as 20th century operas such as Wozzeck and Khovanshchina. For Hanjo, the Bayerische Staatsoper co-operated with the Haus der Kunst, which was also the venue for the production.
#BSOritorno
Christopher Rüping, one of the most promising young theatre directors in the German-speaking world, staged his first piece of music theatre for the Bayerische Staatsoper with Il ritorno / The year of magical thinking by Claudio Monteverdi. The play by Joan Didion based on her memoirs was also performed. From 2015 to 2019, Rüping was in-house director at the Kammerspiele in Munich, a position he has held at Schauspielhaus Zürich since the 2019/20 season. He has received a total of four invitations to the Berlin Theatertreffen and has twice been voted Young Director of the Year by Theater Heute. Set designer Jonathan Mertz and costume designer Lene Schwind have been long and constant companions on Rüping's journey. Malte Ubenauf and Rüping also work together in the theatre. Ubenauf last worked with director Christoph Marthaler on the production of Giuditta by Franz Lehár at the Bayerische Staatsoper in the 2021/22 season. Musical Director Christopher Moulds has a special connection to Monteverdi's work and the Bayerische Staatsoper: he was Ivor Bolton's musical assistant for the new production of Monteverdi's Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria at the Bayerische Staatsoper in 2001, conducted the repertoire performances in the following years and is very familiar with the historically informed version specially created for Munich.
#BSOaida
Director Damiano Michieletto and set designer Paolo Fantin have been working together artistically since their collaboration for the Graz Ring Award in 2004. Costume designer Carla Teti has also been part of the team since 2004. Together they have realised works at opera houses in Italy, the Netherlands, Zurich, London, Salzburg, Vienna, Paris and Berlin. Lighting designer Alessandro Carletti has also been part of Michieletto's creative circle since 2008.
The new production of Aida was conducted by Daniele Rustioni from Milan, a specialist in the Italian repertoire that has already taken him to the world's major opera houses from New York to Milan. He has been Principal Guest Conductor in Munich since 2021 and can be seen in productions by Verdi, Puccini and Berlioz as well as in concerts.
#BSOgetlost #BSOkindco
One night that changes everything. Four young people on a quest. Searching for what holds them together, for what makes each of them special, for friendship or loneliness. An odyssey that takes them to their limits. A journey that involves the risk of losing oneself.
As soon as you enter the backstage area of this Kind&Co production, you are drawn into the spell and maelstrom of a special evening created by director Daniel Pfluger and Munich-based musician and sound inventor Enik with singers, actors and musicians. It led the audience into an immersive sound situation that invited them to follow the traces of the four protagonists themselves with their smartphones using short video works (video: Sarah Scherer). The inspiration was Claudio Monteverdi's music, which delves into the depths of human emotion and expresses emotions in a raw and direct way. The special musical world of opera mingled with club culture. Motifs from the Odyssey merged with contemporary stories about what happens when you lose yourself.
#apollonstufenbar #apollon #BSOapollon #BSOstufenbar
On 18 June 2023, the Apollon Stufenbar opened the 2023 Opera Summer in the city. Even before the start of the Munich Opera Festival, the Apollon Stufenbar invited guests to enjoy cool drinks on balmy summer nights on the steps of the Nationaltheater. A varied programme with DJs, drinks and music followed until the end of the season.
#BSOfestival
The 2023 Munich Opera Festival brought together new productions that drew on the guiding principle of the 2022/23 season. Two seemingly contradictory complexes, war and love, closely interwoven. At the end of the opera festival, the focus was on works by Giuseppe Verdi and Richard Wagner, two composers who are antagonists in vision and temperament, leaders of competing musical currents. Five of the greatest operas were on the programme: Aida - a new production at Opera for All -, Otello and Don Carlo by Verdi and Lohengrin - also a new production - as well as Tristan und Isolde by Wagner. The state of love could not be more different here. A struggle of the titans, a plea for love. The two opera premieres of the festival, Hamlet by Brett Dean and Semele by Georg Friedrich Händel, combined early music theatre with contemporary music theatre. Further opera performances: War and Peace by Sergei S. Prokofiev, Così fan tutte by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Dido and Aeneas...Erwartung by Henry Purcell / Arnold Schönberg as further new productions of the current season and repertoire highlights such as Boris Godunov by Modest P. Mussorgsky and Salome by Richard Strauss. The ballet evening Spheres.01 | Goecke with contemporary choreographies celebrated its premiere at the beginning of the festival, complemented by the new productions Schmetterling by Sol León and Paul Lightfoot and Tchaikovsky-Overtures by Alexei Ratmansky.
#BSOhamlet
Brett Dean's opera Hamlet, which premiered at the Glyndebourne Festival in 2017, opened the Munich Opera Festival. General Music Director Vladimir Jurowski took over the musical direction and director Neil Armfield was responsible for bringing his production from Glyndebourne to the Bayerische Staatsoper. The main roles were sung by Allan Clayton and Caroline Wettergreen.
#BSBsphären
Every summer, the Bayerische Staatsballett invites young choreographers to the Prinzregententheater for world premieres, this year for the first time under the title Sphären. Ballet director Laurent Hilaire thus creates a platform for up-and-coming artists to enter into an artistic dialogue with established choreographers. Together with curator Marco Goecke, Hilaire selected this year's choreographers. In Le Grand Sot, Marion Motin put dancers and audience into a trance with a congenial boléro performance in which hip-hop met ballet. Nicolas Paul created an embodiment of time to the echoing sounds of orthodox church music, while Fran Diaz explored the question of stability in times of crisis. Marco Goecke's All Long Dem Day to the beguiling sounds of Nina Simone's Sinnerman, danced by the Bayerisches Junior Ballett München, also conjured up catchy tunes.
#BSO500
Two special concerts to mark the anniversary of the Bayerische Staatsorchester celebrate the Munich "house gods" Richard Strauss and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The first of the two concerts features instrumental late works and an early song cycle by Strauss on the programme, while in the second, the orchestra's woodwind section presents two wind serenades, as well as Mozart's C minor work and Antonín Dvořák's Serenade in D minor.
In the 1st anniversary concert (at the Nationaltheater Munich), General Music Director Vladimir Jurowski conducts a programme that ranges from the music of the young Strauss to two examples of his late instrumental works. The Metamorphoses were composed under the impression of the destruction of the Munich opera house, an epitaph to a lost era and a swan song to a time whose entanglements resonate in the polyphonic interweaving of the 23 solo strings. With the Sonatina for 16 wind instruments, Strauss takes up the scoring of a youthful work. Self-ironically described as a "wrist exercise", as a postscript, so to speak, to his actually completed work, this opus "from the workshop of an invalid" is also an example of Strauss's contrapuntal mastery of emotional condensation. Marlis Petersen has been a welcome guest at the Nationaltheater since the beginning of her operatic career, celebrated as the Queen of the Night as well as Marietta or Lulu and most recently in Strauss roles such as Salome and Marschallin. As a good friend of the Bayerische Staatsorchester, she enriches the programme with a rarity: she sings the song cycle Mädchenblumen in an arrangement for chamber ensemble by Eberhard Kloke, in whose arrangement of Der Rosenkavalier the orchestra accompanied her in her role debut as the Marschallin.
TO THE 1ST ANNIVERSARY CONCERT
The 2nd anniversary concert (in Munich's Prinzregentheater) will feature the woodwind section of the Bayerische Staatsorchester performing two of the pinnacle works of the serenade genre. In 1782, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart had just begun to establish himself as a freelance composer and musician in Vienna after the head of personnel of his Salzburg employer had kicked him out of his employment. The commission to provide a work for the newly founded "imperial harmony" (wind band) by Joseph II was welcome, but at short notice ("I had to make a night of music quickly, but only on harmony"), and as so often, Mozart's contribution far outstripped the usual: in fact, he created a veritable wind symphony with the nocturnal, sombre Serenade in C minor. Antonín Dvořák had this model in mind when he wrote a serenade in a minor key for woodwind instruments almost a hundred years later - two works that exploit the rich expressive possibilities of oboe, clarinet, horn and bassoon, in the case of the Bohemian composer further enriched by cello and double bass.
TO THE 2ND ANNIVERSARY CONCERT
#BSOsemele
Semele is director Claus Guth's third production at the Bayerische Staatsoper. In 2007 he staged Giuseppe Verdi's Luisa Miller, in 2022 Bluthaus by Georg Friedrich Haas. The first collaboration between Guth and set designer Michael Levine, Jenůfa by Leoš Janáček, celebrated its premiere at the Royal Opera House London in 2021. Michael Bauer (lighting) and Guth have known each other since their time as interns at the Bayerische Staatsoper during their student days. Guth's production of the baroque opera Dido and Aeneas, his diploma thesis, premiered at the Munich Reithalle in 1991. Handel and Guth have been a tradition ever since: Radamisto Opernhaus Zürich 2004, Rinaldo Opernhaus Zürich 2008, Messiah Theater an der Wien 2009, Jephta De Nationale Opera Amsterdam 2016, Rodelinda Teatro Real Madrid 2017, Saul Theater an der Wien 2018 and Orlando Theater an der Wien 2019.
#BSOofa #operfueralle #BSOfestspiele #BMWoperanext
Summer, sun and an open-air opera: our audience enjoyed music in the open air, with a live broadcast from the National Theatre and an open-air concert.
#BSOaida
Picnic, great weather and Verdi's Aida. Over 10,000 people gathered on Max-Joseph-Platz in front of the National Theatre on 23 July 2023 to enjoy the Opera for All experience. Giuseppe Verdi's opera Aida was broadcast live from the National Theatre onto the square. In summer temperatures, young and old watched the tragic opera on the screen and in the auditorium. Everyone then celebrated the successful evening together under a shower of confetti on the steps of the National Theatre.
#BSO500
The documentary was a joint production of BR-KLASSIK and ARTE. The homage "500 Years of the Bavarian State Orchestra" by Victor Grandits and Magdalena Adugna sought to unravel the mystery of this living entity.
MORE INFORMATION
#BSOako
Gustav Mahler's Eighth Symphony is a pinnacle not only of his own oeuvre, but of the genre as a whole; in fact, it marks the culmination of two genres of musical art, the symphony and the oratorio, combining musical elements such as those pioneered by Ludwig van Beethoven in his Ninth Symphony (the first to include the human voice) and in his Missa solemnis (which integrates the sacred text into a symphonic structure). While Mahler's Eighth reaches record-breaking heights in terms of scale and the number of performers - the composer only grudgingly accepted the term "Symphony of a Thousand" coined by premiere organiser Emil Gutmann - it also touches on the depths of Mahler's world view and his religious and philosophical convictions.
Gustav Mahler played an important role in the Academy Concerts that Kirill Petrenko organised with the Bayerische Staatsorchester; no composer's name appeared more frequently on his programmes. In addition to the Third, Fifth and Sixth Symphonies, the Lied von der Erde and other orchestral songs, the performance of the Seventh Symphony in particular gained resonant significance, as the Bayerische Staatsoper Recordings label was to be launched with its recording. It is the only audio recording that Kirill Petrenko has released from his Munich period, and that it is worthy of this honour has been demonstrated not least by a series of nominations and awards from the recording industry, in particular the prestigious Gramophone Award in the orchestral works category. A performance of the Eighth Symphony had been planned for a long time and was originally scheduled to take place in the 2019/20 season, Kirill Petrenko's last as acting Bavarian General Music Director. The coronavirus pandemic cancelled this plan. Under the aegis of the new artistic director Serge Dorny, the invitation from the Musikalische Akademie - with many of the soloists already scheduled for 2021 - has finally been realised.
#BSOfigaro
Le nozze di Figaro opened the new season of 23 - 24 and was the first collaboration between the Kazakhstan-born director Evgeny Titov, who recently made his debut at the Komische Oper Berlin and the Residenztheater Munich, and the renowned Irish set and costume designer Annemarie Woods and the Canadian lighting designer D.M. Wood. Titov has a long working relationship with dramaturge and musicologist Janine Ortiz in spoken theatre, including at the Salzburg Festival and the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus. The musical director was Stefano Montanari, who has already made several guest appearances at the Bayerische Staatsoper as a specialist in baroque and early classical repertoire.
#BSOako
A long-awaited reunion: Kent Nagano, former General Music Director of the Bayerische Staatsorchester, returned to conduct the 2nd Academy Concert in the Bayerische Staatsorchester's anniversary year. The programme reflected his passion for combining the seemingly familiar with the semi-forgotten and the completely new.
The Bayerische Staatsoper was honoured as "Opera Company of the Year" at the International Opera Awards 2023. The International Opera Awards, the Oscars of the opera world, were presented for the eleventh time. The awards ceremony took place at the Teatr Wielki in Warsaw in a festive setting. In addition to the award for Opera House of the Year, the highly acclaimed new production War and Peace was also honoured as "New Production" of the year.
The Bayerische Staatsoper has been honoured several times in the critics' survey conducted by the trade journal Opernwelt. In the annual survey of over 40 international music critics, awards were presented in 15 categories. The Bayerische Staatsorchester was once again voted "Orchestra of the Year" and Dmitri Tcherniakov was named "Director of the Year". The production of War and Peace at the Bayerische Staatsoper is honoured as "Performance of the Year", Konstantin Krimmel is "Young Singer of the Year".
Vera-Lotte Boecker received the Faust Prize for Best Actor:in Musical Theatre for her role as Nadja in Bluthaus.
The Bayerische Staatsoper received the Austrian Music Theater Prize 2023 for the production Bluthaus, director Friederike Blum received the Götz Friedrich Prize for Music Theater Direction.
Orphea in love by director Axel Ranisch was awarded the Grand Prix at the Golden Prague Film Festival.
#BSOrec
Since May 2021, the Bayerische Staatsoper has been documenting its excellence, versatility and tradition with its own label: Bayerische Staatsoper Recordings.
Discover selected opera productions and concert recordings from this year!
#BSOjubiläum
Sixty years ago, on 21 November 1963, a miracle occurred: Munich's Nationaltheater was ceremoniously reopened almost twenty years after the end of the war. A miracle in that it took great perseverance to realise this major project in economically difficult post-war times. For two decades, the people of Munich had had to live with the torso in the heart of the city. Now it had been rebuilt - a commitment to Munich as a city of culture.
#BSBleparc
Angelin Preljocaj created Le Parc in 1994 for the Paris Opera Ballet with Isabelle Guérin and Laurent Hilaire in the leading roles. In 2023, Laurent Hilaire brought the masterpiece to Munich and passed on his knowledge to the current generation of dancers. Le Parc is about the phases of a gallant seduction and offers a fascinating look at the fleeting moments of love. In the course of the performance, a game develops between temptation and devotion, between budding and disappointed love affairs, between fleeting and yet long-lasting encounters. Preljocaj takes a contemporary look at the highly stylised traditions and rules of love and life in the 17th and 18th centuries. The main couple grow closer and closer over the three acts of the ballet and finally come together in the final pas de deux, which has become known as the "flying kiss".
#BSOfledermaus
After Das schlaue Füchslein, Der Rosenkavalier and Agrippina, among others, director Barrie Kosky presents his sixth directorial work at the Nationaltheater with the production of Die Fledermaus: Der Rosenkavalier and Der feurige Engel were created under the musical direction of Munich's General Music Director Vladimir Jurowski, with whom Barrie Kosky has worked closely since the beginning of his directorship at the Komische Oper Berlin in 2012/13. The two are continuing this collaboration for Die Fledermaus. Klaus Bruhns is responsible for the costume design. The stage will be designed by Rebekka Ringst, who has already developed the theatre spaces for Der feurige Engel and Agrippina. Otto Pichler is responsible for the choreography. He was already a guest at the Nationaltheatre for Der feurige Engel.
During the ongoing rehearsals for the new production of the Johann Strauß operetta Die Fledermaus at the Bayerische Staatsoper, filming for an ARD Kultur producion began at the Nationaltheater at December 1, 2023. The production of "Rache und Liebe" (WT) with Marie Nasemann, Eidin Jalali, Wilson Gonzales Ochsenknecht and Vivien König will presumably be broadcastet in the ARD Mediathek and on ardkultur.de in summer 2024.
#BSO500
The last major concert in the Bayerische Staatsorchester's anniversary year took place in Munich Cathedral, probably the world's most famous architectural symbol of the Bavarian capital as the "Frauenkirche". With Missa BWV 232I, the early version of Bach's Mass in B minor, it celebrated the ensemble's past in church music, its roots in tradition and the stylistic versatility that the orchestra has developed and preserved over the centuries. Young singers, almost all of whom are current and former members of the ensemble and opera studio and have close ties to the house, took part as soloists, as did the Munich Bach-Chor, an institution of choral music from the Baroque to the present day for decades.
The orchestral celebration year ends with a signal in the spirit of opera for all: the Bayerische Staatsorchester wants to contribute as much as possible to making music and culture in general accessible to everyone. The proceeds from this concert will therefore go to the non-profit organization KulturRaum München, which supports Munich residents affected by poverty in participating in the city's cultural life through visits to the theater, cinema or concerts.
