Semperoper Dresden

Nora Schmid's appointment as Artistic Director in 2024 will be the start of a new chapter in the 350-year history of the Dresden opera house. This history does not begin with the opening of the first Semper Opera House in 1841, nor with the founding of the ‘German Opera Department’ under Carl Maria von Weber and Heinrich Vitzthum von Eckstädt on 1 January 1817, but – at least – to the first German opera: ‘Dafne’ by the Electoral-Saxon court music director Heinrich Schütz, premiered by the Saxon Court Chapel in Torgau on 13 April 1627. The founding of the Sächsische Hofkapelle on 22 September 1548 can be considered the earliest possible beginning of Dresden's opera history. Since 1667, opera has had its own permanent home in Dresden, although the buildings and locations have changed over the centuries.

Regardless of where the opera was based at any given time, important artistic personalities always contributed to the reputation of Dresden as a centre of opera. In addition to the aforementioned court music directors Schütz and Weber, Johann Adolph Hasse and Johann Gottlieb Naumann cemented the reputation of the Dresden opera as one of the most important institutions of its kind, right up to the ‘household gods’ Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss. Wagner, the Royal Court Music Director, premiered his operas Rienzi (1842), The Flying Dutchman (1843) and Tannhäuser (1845) in Dresden. Richard Strauss staged a total of nine premieres in Dresden, including Salome (1905), Elektra (1909) and Der Rosenkavalier (1911). But there is no reason to dwell only on the past: the Saxon State Opera continues to perform at the highest level in the fields of opera, ballet and concerts.
The top-class ensembles based at the theatre make a significant contribution to this.