When the nights are at their longest, frosty wind and snow storms sweep the land, it is the time of the Koliada – of the pagan winter solstice feast and the Christian-orthodox Christmas celebration in equal measure. In these magical “twelve days of Christmas” the barrier between the human world and the realm of dark beings becomes especially thin. Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov’s “true” Christmas song, Die Nacht vor Weihnachten, based on the eponymous story by Nikolai Gogol, also plays out in this very same period.

Die Nacht vor Weihnachten

Max-Joseph-Platz

Is it possible to perform the comic intermezzo “Zerbinetta and her Lovers” and the tragic opera “Ariadne” at the same time? Yes, when you have to. The richest man in Vienna wants it that way. He wants cross-over! Let’s mix up classic and pop – and it works. To the delight of the audience and the recognition of the characters on stage.  One of the handsomest and wisest works of the great Munich composer, Richard Strauss, in a production by Robert Carsen. The joy of Strauss!

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Ariadne Auf Naxos

Munich Residence

Count Almaviva has himself abolished the iusprimae noctis, or "right of the lord". A fact, however, which does not prevent him from trying to seduce the Countess’s maid, Susanna, just before her marriage to Figaro. A clear case of sexual harassment. But, what happens when the culprit has plenty of money and power? Or, can even bend the law to suit their wishes? Le nozze di Figaro was more than just a comedy back in Mozart’s day. The world portrayed is brim full of criminal machinations and blatant fraud and chicanery by the powerful and almighty. Lorenzo Da Ponte’s libretto based on the scandalous play by the French revolutionary, Beaumarchais, leads the colourful characters of a comedy of the classes into situations so hopeless that emptiness and the desire to die spread to all quarters. And so the Count’s love for his new wife following their marriage suddenly goes ice-cold, although he has just recently spectacularly freed her from the clutches of her custodian. The resourceful Figaro of all people had helped him here, and in gratitude, the Count now employs him as his personal valet, perhaps as questionable compensation for Susanna’s harassment. Hardly conquered, the countess finds herself neglected and longs for either Almaviva's love or her own death. It takes a great deal of intrigue and counter-intrigue to disempower the encroaching count and allow Susanna's wedding to her beloved Figaro to take place after all.

The Marriage Of Figaro

A maelstrom of violence is unleashed when love turns to envy, when actions are driven by betrayal and madness. David’s triumph over the giant Goliath comes to an abrupt end when King Saul views the young hero as a rival for the throne. Although Saul does everything in his power to kill David, the latter enjoys divine protection. In the end, Saul himself dies and David takes the crown for himself.

Saul

Semperoper Dresden

When Richard Wagner developed his initial ideas for Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg in the mid-1840s, he had no intention of writing a monumental "festive opera". The work was intended to be a facile comedy, a jovial and humorous satyr play to place alongside his Tannhäuser, since – like Tannhäuser – reflections on art and artists are its focus. More than two decades later, he had a musical score that was one of the most extensive and multi-layered of his entire repertoire, and that aroused controversy.

The Mastersingers of Nuremberg

Bebelplatz

"How beautiful Princess Salome is tonight!". Oscar Wilde's French drama, arranged as opera text by the composer himself, was a stroke of genius of the fin de siècle, a scandal on one hand and an absolute hit on the other, both an artistic and a financial success which allowed Richard Strauss to buy his villa in Garmisch. Salome demands the head of the prophet, John the Baptist, who has rejected her, from her lustful stepfather – and bound by an oath, he cannot deny her. And so the zealous admonisher dies, and with him the princess is undone – "Kill this woman!". Krzysztof Warlikowski is convinced that Salome recounts many of the contradictions of the period of origin, that in this piece, however, much is also dismissed of that which at the time was still the future: "It's not just what's in the work of art itself that is important, whether it be Oscar Wilde or Richard Strauss, but rather the whole context, which Christianity and the history of the 20th century add to this piece."

Salome

Dressed as a man and calling herself “Fidelio”, Leonore surreptitiously gains the confidence of the jailer Rocco and his daughter Marzelline, thus gaining access to the high security tract where her husband Florestan has been despotically incarcerated by Don Pizarro. Florestan is in mortal danger, but this does not intimidate his wife, who is determined to liberate him. Finally, however, the two of them can only be rescued by an emissary from the monarch. At the end, a Utopia in the form of a final chorus sets the stage aglow, not only as a plea for freedom and justice, but also concurrently as a condemnation of the anxieties and restrictions of human existence.

Fidelio

Elektra's father: murdered. Her mother and her paramour Ägisth were his murderers. The disheveled Elektra is determined to avenge the parricide. She has the axe for the deed but not the strength. Then her brother Orest appears … Armor-plated emotions! – whipped up by a gigantic orchestra. An aristocratic cast of singers. An enthusiastically cheered staging by Herbert Wernicke. A shattering drama of the Soul.

Elektra

There are few operas, which from the very first bar endure such intense pressure, few in which the temperature swings from ice-cold calculation to overheating in mere seconds. And scarcely any in which private entanglement and personal tragedy are so interwoven with political attitudes in historical accuracy. Giacomo Puccini’s Tosca has electrified audiences since its world premiere. The shock wave emitted by the opera was so strong that decades later many reactions still tend to point to the bewilderment and overpowering of those affected rather than the qualities of the piece itself and its love triangle surrounding the singer Floria Tosca, the painter Mario Cavaradossi and the chief of police Baron Scarpia. The artistic world of the protagonist couple, Tosca and Cavaradossi, is no colouristic ingredient here, but rather defines the profile of its characters – it justifies Tosca’s eccentricity, just as it does Cavaradossi’s liberality and also explains the singer’s pronounced self-confidence: The heroine of the stage becomes a heroine in real life. Scarpia’s appearance must also be understood as the emergence of his unleashed totalitarian power, and his sexual sadism still today as one of the truly scandalous moments of opera literature. The historical detail is certainly no staffage, but rather forms the, “precondition of the conflict between the representatives of two opposing social systems” (Norbert Christen) in a time of crisis. With his mish-mash of musical recognition motifs, which, with the exception of the rigid Scarpia chords, sensitively adjust to the situations, Puccini achieves a new dimension of through-composed operatic structure – in the intensive cohesion of the score, he nevertheless creates islands in which reflection compacts itself into moments of the highest possible arioso intensity.

TOSCA

The people are thirsty for blood. Another suitor for the hand of the sovereign is about to be publicly beheaded, because Princess Turandot is determined never to belong to any man. That’s why anyone who wants to marry her must first solve three riddles. Anyone who fails has to pay with his life. An unknown prince, revolted by Turandot’s cruelty, yet attracted by her beauty, takes on this potentially lethal risk – and solves the riddles. But has he awakened the ice-cold, man-murdering sovereign to love and put an end to her barbarity?

Turandot

Rusalka feels trapped in a world from which there is no escape. She is ready to put her immortality on the line in return for a human soul, so she can gain the love of a handsome prince. But she must pay for it with her voice. Muted and liberated from her dark world, she is forced to watch as the prince rejects her in favor of a foreign princess – dooming them both. She cannot live, she cannot die, yet nevertheless at the end, she helps the prince find his death with a “rescuing” kiss.

Tansel Akzeybek

Events

Upcoming events

Oct 12, 2025 - May 24, 2026

The Marriage Of Figaro · Bayerische Staatsoper

Nov 29 - Dec 22, 2025

Die Nacht vor Weihnachten · Bayerische Staatsoper

Feb 23 - Mar 5, 2026

Salome · Bayerische Staatsoper

Mar 8 - Jul 18, 2026

Fidelio · Bayerische Staatsoper

18 - 27 Mar, 2026

Elektra · Bayerische Staatsoper

Past events

Nov 29 - Dec 22, 2025

Die Nacht vor Weihnachten · Bayerische Staatsoper

15 - 18 Oct, 2025

Ariadne Auf Naxos · Bayerische Staatsoper

Future and recently performed repertoire

Pang in Turandot by Puccini

Bayerische Staatsoper

The Forester in Rusalka by Dvořák

Bayerische Staatsoper

A dance master in Ariadne auf Naxos by Strauss

Bayerische Staatsoper

Abner · High Priest · Doeg in Saul by Handel

Semperoper Dresden

Basil in The Marriage of Figaro by Mozart

Bayerische Staatsoper

Shuttle in Tosca by Puccini

Bayerische Staatsoper

Zweiter Jude in Salome by Strauss

Bayerische Staatsoper

Ein junger Diener in Elektra by Strauss

Bayerische Staatsoper

1. Gefangener in Fidelio by Beethoven

Bayerische Staatsoper

The devil in The Night Before Christmas by Rimsky-Korsakov

Bayerische Staatsoper

About

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