Volksoper Vienna

The Volksoper Wien is Vienna’s second biggest opera theatre. The Vienna Volksoper (Volksoper or Vienna People’s Opera) is a Vienna, Austria, opera house. During its yearly season, which spans from September to June, it stages three hundred performances of twenty-five German-language productions of opera, operetta, musicals, and ballet.

On three floors, guests have access to 1261 chairs, 72 standing spaces, and 3 wheelchair spaces.

Two electrically operated raising platforms are available in the orchestra pit.The load-bearing capability is 500 kg/m2 (single podium in front, double-deck podium on stage side), and the height is adjustable from 0 to 2.65 meters below stage level.

The main red velvet curtain may be hydraulically collected and raised.The shirring speed ranges from 0.15 to 3.0 m/s, with a maximum lifting speed of 2 m/s.

The aluminum frame sound curtain is also hydraulically operated.With a point load of 150 kg, the extra load capacity is 300 kg.As a sound curtain, the lifting speed can reach 0.8 m/s, and as a heavy-duty hoist, it can reach 0.5 m/s.

The hydraulically powered curtain pull has a 350 kg load capacity and a 150 kg point load.

The stage area is 480 m2 and can support a maximum weight of 500 kg/m2.The useable stage width is 17.2 meters, and the stage depth is 19 meters from the front edge of the gateway to the folding sliding door.

The stage area is made up of a rotating and liftable core disk in the centre with a diameter of 7.20 m and a rotatable ring disk with an outer diameter of 15 meters around the core disks.People can also use three hand-operated stationary sinks.

The Bundestheater Holding has held the Volksoper Wien, the Staatsoper Wien GmbH, and the Burgtheater GmbH since 1999.Theaterservice GmbH is another subsidiary that is 51.1% controlled by Bundestheaterholding.The three stage firms each own 16.3% of the remaining 48.9%.The Volksoper, like the Vienna State Opera, is subservient to the autonomous ARGE Ballet of the Vienna State Opera and Volksoper.

History

The Kaiserjubiläum-Stadttheater (Kaiser’s Jubilee Civic Theatre) was erected in 1898 and initially produced solely plays. Because of the short building time (10 months), the first director, Adam Müller-Gutenbrunn, had to start with 160,000 florins in debt. After such a shaky start, the Kaiserjubiläum-Stadttheater was forced to declare bankruptcy five years later, in 1903.

Rainer Simons took over the house on September 1, 1903, and renamed it the Kaiserjubiläum-Stadttheater – Volksoper (public opera). His objective was to continue producing plays while also establishing opera and operetta programs. Tosca and Salome had their initial Viennese performances at the Volksoper in 1907 and 1910, respectively. Maria Jeritza, Leo Slezak, and Richard Tauber performed there, and conductor Alexander Zemlinsky became the inaugural bandmaster in 1906.

The Volksoper rose to become Vienna’s second most prestigious opera theatre in the years leading up to and during World War I. Felix Weingartner was appointed creative director and lead conductor in 1919. Hugo Gruder-Guntram took over as creative director after Weingartner. After 1929, it shifted to light opera, and under Gruder-Guntram, it made summer tours to Abbazia in 1935, Cairo and Alexandria in 1937, and across Italy in 1938, with guest appearances by Richard Tauber. Following WWII, the Vienna Volksoper became an alternate venue to the wrecked Vienna State Opera. The Volksoper resumed its traditional function of presenting opera, operetta, and musicals in 1955.

The Volksoper appeared in the James Bond film The Living Daylights in 1987, doubling for a fictional “udové konzervatorium” (“People’s Conservatory” – direct translation of “Volksoper” into Slovak) in Bratislava, as Czechoslovakia was still under Communist rule at the time; the interior was shot at Sofiensaal. In the film, KGB General Koskov, who is defecting to the West, attends a concert, and Bond and his handler Saunders cover him from an apartment across the street (the building across Währingerstraße is a candy store called “Zum süßen Eck” in real life).

From September 1991 to June 1996, the Vienna Volksoper was co-directed by the Vienna State Opera. The Volksoper became a wholly owned subsidiary of the Bundestheater-Holding in 1999.

Since 1 September 2007, Robert Meyer has served as artistic director of the Volksoper, with business manager Christoph Ladstätter. Meyer’s term is expected to end in 2022. In October 2020, the company announced the choice of Lotte de Beer as its new creative director, the first woman to hold the position, beginning on September 1, 2022, for a five-year term.In December 2020, the firm announced the selection of Omer Meir Wellber as its next music director, beginning on September 1, 2022, for a five-year starting contract.

Vienna, Austria