Season 2010/11
Press
The new opera house
The Theater an der Wien numbers among the most beautiful theatres in Vienna and has one of the richest traditions, too. It was built in 1801 in the spirit of Mozart by Emanuel Schikaneder, the librettist of The Magic Flute. A host of major theatrical works have been premiered here, for example Beethoven’s opera Fidelio.
In 2006, the Mozart Year, the Theater an der Wien was reopened as the city of Vienna’s new opera house with a gala featuring Plácido Domingo, and will now stage performances all the year round. The Theater an der Wien is a marvellous addition to the internationally renowned operatic scene in Vienna and underscores the city’s reputation as a centre of culture and music. Beyond Mozart Year 2006 operas from the baroque period to the present day will be staged to the very highest artistic standard.
Programme for the 2009/10 Season
The new season provides international highlights for Vienna all the year round, with no summer break. With thirteen premieres on the programme, the Theater an der Wien once again places the emphasis firmly on productions of the very highest quality.
On the cover of the printed programme, the city of Vienna’s opera house has placed a significant symbol – a beating heart representing inspiration, creativity, dynamism and longing. This potent diversity, ranging from the baroque to the modern, is also reflected in the works featured in the new season. These include fascinating musical theatre by Claudio Monteverdi, Christoph Willibald Gluck, Johann Sebastian Bach, Joseph Haydn and Gioachino Rossini, as well as Carl Maria von Weber, Johann Strauss, Benjamin Britten and Hans Werner Henze plus a premiere of a work by Johannes Kalitzke.
Artistic quality of the highest order is guaranteed by the conductors Nikolaus Harnoncourt, René Jacobs, Bertrand de Billy, Donald Runnicles, Christopher Moulds, Marc Albrecht, Harry Bicket, Cornelius Meister and Johannes Kalitzke and the opera directors Christof Loy, Tobias Moretti, Robert Carsen, Stephen Lawless, Philipp Himmelmann, Kasper Bech Holten, Torsten Fischer and Stefan Ruzowitzky, who will be directing his first opera. And the opera house also welcomes two of the world’s foremost choreographers, John Neumeier and Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker, as its guests.
The music will once again be provided by first-class ensembles such as the ORF Radio Symphony Orchestra Vienna and the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, along with the Arnold Schoenberg Choir, all three of which have committed themselves to long-term cooperation with the Theater an der Wien. In the genre of baroque opera, celebrated ensembles including the Orchestre des Champs-Élysées, Concentus Musicus Wien and the Balthasar Neumann Ensemble will perform the music as it originally sounded during the 2009/10 season. For the premiere of the opera Die Besessenen by Johannes Kalitzke the Theater an der Wien has succeeded in securing the services of the Klangforum Wien.
The Theater an der Wien’s tenet is to offer top-quality musical theatre to discerning opera audiences. Since it was reopened as the city of Vienna’s new opera house in January 2006, the Theater an der Wien has established itself both nationally and internationally as a centre of baroque opera and modern, contemporary musical theatre. Audience figures confirm the venue’s great popularity: in the 2008/09 season the number of subscriptions sold tripled; on average, 94% of tickets for all musical productions are sold.
