Name: »Freedom! 250 Jahre Declaration of Independence«
Start: 2026-06-27T19:30:00
Location: Oper Graz

Vassilis Christopoulos

Claire Huangci

Oper Graz

Whether singing, dancing, or instrumental music – you can expect a diverse program in an intimate setting, performed by ensemble members, dancers from the Graz Ballet, members of the Graz Philharmonic, and guests. Admission is free!

Espresso concert

Four people going through the hell of their own emotions are at the centre of Jean-Philippe Rameau’s masterpiece Castor et Pollux. Choreographer and director Nanine Linning, already known to audiences in Graz as the director of the Giulietta act of The Tales of Hoffmann in the 2023/24 season, once again merges the intrinsic elements of dance and music theatre in the French baroque opera. Her artistic partner on this journey into the human abyss is Bernhard Forck, a specialist in early music.

Castor and Pollux

Philipp M. Krenn, director of Schlaflos in the 2023/24 season, is staging Richard Strauss and Hugo von Hofmannsthal’s melancholy global success, in which the soaring waltz melodies are just as much historical fiction as the timeless portrait of society full of arrogance, calculated intrigues and complex amours. The celebrated Hungarian soprano Polina Pastirchak returns to Graz Opera as the Marschallin, and former ensemble member Tetiana Miyus as Sophie. At her side: audience favourite Wilfried Zelinka as Ochs von Lerchenau.

The Rosenkavalier

With what is probably the most famous fragment in opera literature, four directing teams are presenting themselves for the first time at Graz Opera, immersing themselves in aesthetically completely different universes with very different artistic approaches – film animation, puppetry and choreographically moving bodies. In three episodes, dazzling worlds full of fantastic characters and events unfold. Always at the centre of the action as the protagonist and creator of the scenery: the poet himself.

Hoffmann's Tales (The Tales of Hoffmann)

250 years of independence, 250 years of freedom! On 4 July 1776, the 13 British colonies declared their independence and thus founded the USA: a major step towards freedom and self-determination. What does this freedom look like today, a quarter of a millennium later? Perhaps in The Unanswered Question, Charles Ives was contemplating the contradictory nature of man’s impatience and desperation to find quick answers to profound questions. At any rate, this is how Leonard Bernstein interpreted the structure and musical development of his compatriot’s work. In his own work, the piano concerto-like Second Symphony The Age of Anxiety, inspired by the poem of the same name by W. H. Auden, Bernstein is also concerned with the great questions of humanity, which four lonely strangers ask themselves in a New York bar.