Mozart’s illustrious operatic oeuvre is rounded off by a work providing both copious entertainment and food for thought, affording a fantastic spectacle and presenting a magical ritual of initiation of the human spirit. All that is encompassed in Die Zauberflöte, and all that can be found in Vladimír Morávek’s colourful production, featuring a thrilling atmosphere and teeming with mysterious symbols. There is something for everyone – adults and children, including, if fear hasn’t consumed them, the very youngest.

Die Zauberflöte

The Estates Theatre

The fruit of the collaboration between the two great creators, Antonín Dvořák and Jaroslav Kvapil, who were close as artists and friends alike, was a magical, dreamy story of the great, unfulfilled desire of the water nymph Rusalka, a work in which Dvořák’s musical genius reached its apex. The fairy-tale atmosphere inspired the composer to create singular, impressionistic music replete with melodic imagination and masterful instrumentation, a suggestive expression of the play of waves and the reflection of moonlight on the surface of a lake, as well as the overwhelming magic of a fairy-tale dream.

Rusalka

State Opera

Carmen is actually one of the first verismo operas that preceded the “manifesto” of the Italian artistic movement. Its style, and the death of the title heroine, which were at variance with the established opéra comique conventions, seem to have been the reason why the work did not give rise to much public enthusiasm at and in the wake of the world premiere in Paris in 1875. Yet Carmen soon triumphed in other European cities.

Carmen

National Theatre Prague

What awaits Hansel and Gretel after they get lost in the forest? The German composer Engelbert Humperdinck transformed the classic Grimm brothers’ fairy tale into an opera with a libretto by his sister Adelheid Wette. Humperdinck’s music is marked by a masterful portrayal of scenes and settings, overflowing with beautiful melodies. Under his pen, fairy-tale characters come to life: woodland fairies, the wicked witch, and children made of gingerbread. Since its premiere in 1893, this opera has enchanted generations of audiences and rightfully belongs among the ten most popular works of the world repertoire. After a long 36 years, it now returns to Plzeň. Don’t worry—everything turns out well in the end!

Hansel and Gretel

Theater of JK Tyl New Stage

A gem of Baroque music, one of the oldest still widely performed and popular operas, the first world-class English opera ... These are among the attributes of Henry Purcell’s best-known work, whose genesis is not yet clear, a work that has not survived in its entirety. The opera was probably first performed in 1689 at the dance master and choreographer Josias Priest’s boarding school for young gentlewomen in Chelsea, London. Some scholars have, however, argued that Purcell wrote the piece for the English court, either for James II or, even earlier, for Charles II. Still others claim that the opera bears within a covert allegory, veiled in a mythological story, with the witches symbolising the Catholic Church, highly unpopular in the England of the time ...

Dido and Aeneas

Engelbert Humperdinck’s Hänsel und Gretel is one of the most frequently performed operas in Germany. Inspired by the Grimm brothers’ popular fairy tale, the libretto was written by the composer’s sister Adelheid Wette, who modified the rather macabre story, adding the characters of the Sandman and the Dew Fairy, as well as the instrumental dream pantomime scene in the forest, and concluding it with the resurrection of the witch’s victims and the happy reunion between the children and their parents. With the music written in the grand Wagnerian romantic style, Humperdinck’s opera also contains folk rhythms, songs for children and old melodies. The world premiere, in Weimar on 23 December 1893, was conducted by Richard Strauss, totally enraptured by the piece. Enraptured too was the audience, and Humperdinck’s Hänsel und Gretel has ever since remained extremely popular in Germany, where every December it has been performed at more than 35 opera houses. In 1905, the piece was first shown at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, where it has often been staged during Christmas.

Lenka Pavlovič

Events

Upcoming events

Aug 26, 2026 - Feb 14, 2027

Die Zauberflöte · Národní divadlo

Sep 1 - Dec 11, 2026

Rusalka · Národní divadlo

Sep 4, 2026 - May 5, 2027

Carmen · Národní divadlo

Sep 5, 2026

Hansel and Gretel · J.K. Tyl Theatre

2 - 13 Dec, 2026

Dido and Aeneas · Národní divadlo

Future and recently performed repertoire

Mařenka in Hansel and Gretel by Humperdinck

J.K. Tyl Theatre

First Wood Sprite in Rusalka by Dvořák

Národní divadlo

Turnspit in Rusalka by Dvořák

Národní divadlo

Second Witch in Dido and Aeneas by Purcell

Národní divadlo

Frasquita in Carmen by Bizet

Národní divadlo

Papagena in Die Zauberflöte by Mozart

Národní divadlo

Fairy in Hänsel und Gretel by Humperdinck

Národní divadlo

About

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