Staatsoper

Find the complete  Staatsoper Season and book your tickets online now. 

What are the must-see performances at the Hamburg Staatsoper this season?

With its extensive programme, performances almost every day from October to July, and one of Europe's most dynamic resident ballet companies, it is truly difficult not to find a performance to your liking.

Hamburg Opera is a constantly evolving centre, with many contemporary works and an innovative staging concept that often spills over into the more classical repertoire, surprising many unaccustomed audiences. One could listen to the works of composers such as Telemann and Handel; the latter was hired as a violinist and harpsichord player by the Opera at the age of 18. A few years later, the same Handel became the talk of the town, when he fought a duel with Johann Mattheson, a rival composer.

Settled in the newly reconstructed opera house in 1955 and led by such brilliant managers as Rolf Liebermann (1959-1973, he returned in 1985), the Staatsoper became a Mecca of contemporary opera, welcoming composers such as Stravinsky, who came to conduct to celebrate his eightieth birthday, Penderecki, Messiaen, Kagel, Xenakis, and Helmut Lachenmann.

The dance season, like the opera season, skilfully combines classical and contemporary, although the high quality of the season is largely due to the more than forty-year collaboration with John Neumeier.