The State Opera will begin the celebrations of the 120th anniversary of the opening of the building

Prague - The State Opera Prague will kick off the celebrations of the 120th anniversary of the opening of its building this Saturday with an open house. For the evening, an exhibition of historical photographs and a performance of the opera Rusalka by Antonín Dvořák have been prepared. The highlight of the anniversary will be the February premiere of the contemporary opera Héléne by Camille Saint-Saëns, and as part of this year's Prague Spring, a May premiere of The Flying Dutchman by Richard Wagner, said the opera's spokesperson Miroslava Kaňková to the Czech News Agency.
According to her, on Saturday, people will be able to tour the entire building, including backstage, with historical commentary available in both Czech and English. The evening program will begin with the opening of an exhibition of historical postcards of the theater building titled Greetings from Prague. In Dvořák's Rusalka, directed by Zdeněk Troška, the main roles will be played by soprano Adriana Kohútková and tenor Tomáš Černý.
The premiere of the opera Héléne is planned for February 13; it will feature primarily members of the home stage under the baton of Guillaume Tourniaire. The concert performance of the opera will be complemented by a song cycle called Persian Night, composed to the text of French poet Armand Renaud. The score of this opera was reportedly recently discovered in the Monte Carlo theater archive after more than 100 years.
In March and April, a revived premiere of Pagliacci by Ruggero Leoncavallo and The Phantom of the Opera by Petr Malásek will take place. According to Kaňková, among other plans for the first half of the year is a revival of the scenic concert suite Peer Gynt by Edvard Grieg. The company is also preparing for a fourth trip to Salzburg in autumn 2008 with the opera Turandot by Giacomo Puccini.
The history of the opera building began in the second half of the 19th century when a large German minority lived in Prague. After the opening of the Czech National Theater, there was a desire to build a new opera house. In 1883, the German Theater Society was established to raise funds for the construction of a representative German opera house, resulting in one of the most beautiful theater buildings in Europe. The first performance in the new German theater - Wagner's opera Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg - took place on January 5, 1888. The successful period of the German stage lasted until 1938.
During the war, the theater was not regularly active, and after liberation, the building was assigned to the newly established May 5 Theater. After a year, it became independent under the name Great Opera of May 5. In the 1948/49 season, it became part of the National Theater and was renamed Smetana Theater. In 1992, it became independent and is now called the State Opera Prague. Last year, the Ministry of Culture proposed that the already heavily underfunded stage could once again merge with the National Theater for budgetary reasons.