OPERA IN BUCHAREST

PERFORMANCES AT THE NATIONAL OPERA IN

BUCHAREST

Bucharest National Opera House needed headquarters since the beginning of the 19th century. The nowadays building housing the National Opera in Bucharest was designed in 1946.

BUCHAREST NATIONAL OPERA 2018

We visited the Romanian National Opera House in Bucharest in January 2018. It was Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro performance with great artists. We had a great view for we bought tickets for seats at the first floor which is quite fine for they are cheaper than if you chose to stay down just in front of the stage.

WHEN WAS ROMANIA NATIONAL OPERA OPEN

A great international festival dedicated to youth and students which was to be housed by Romania put pressure on the communist authorities. Thus, works at the new headquarters of the Romania National Opera ended in 1953 and, at the inauguration, workers’ families got free access to a special show. The Opera was housed by the NATIONAL THEATRE in University Square but the building was almost destroyed during the war. Now, it is on Opera Square, on the right coming from MILITARY CIRCLE. The new headquarters was marked by a premiere. Queen of Spades by Pyotr Ilych Tchaikovsky was performed on 9 January 1954. It was followed by the premiere of the ballet Coppelia by Leo Delibes, a production signed by Anton Romanowski who had just moved to Romania.

HISTORY OF ROMANIAN OPERA

The first Italian theater was opened in Bucharest in 1843 and it has to do with the National Opera, for it was opened with the opera Norma by Vincenzo Bellini, followed by the Barber of Seville by Rossini. In 1870, the composer and conductor George Stefanescu tried to persuade the authorities to build a headquarters for the Opera. Thus he launches the Opera Company in 1885 with the performance of Linda di Chamonix by Donizetti, sung in Romanian. Only in 1921, the Opera Company receives the necessary funds in order to organize itself in the new institutional order, becoming the Romanian Opera. The premiere of Lohengrin by Richard Wagner, with George Enescu conducting, was the opening performance that year.

GEORGE ENESCU AND THE ROMANIAN OPERA

Another great moment of the Bucharest National Opera was in 1958, when the company had already received its headquarters. We are talking about the staging of George Enescu’s Oedipus, during the first edition of George Enescu International Festival, in the same year. After 1990, the ballet company performed masterpieces like Romeo and Juliet by Serghei Prokofiev, Carmina Burana by Carl Orff or Daphnis and Chloe by Maurice Ravel and many, many others.
The theater was built in classical style. The main hall ha 2200 seats, surrounded by lodges and an amazing acoustics. There are four caryatids, four statues, Drama and Poetry statues, a bas-relief called Music and another one called The Dance. George Enescu’s monument is in front of the building. For more information about the great composer, you might like to visit GEORGE ENESCU MUSEUM in Bucharest. Performances start in September and end in June.

SEE MAP…