Leipzig Opera House

The opera in Leipzig has a tradition spanning more than three hundred years. The first opera house on Brühl was built in 1693. After the Teatro San Cassiano in Venice and the opera on Gänsemarkt in Hamburg, it was the third bourgeois opera house in the world. In addition to Richard Wagner, who was born in Leipzig, the history of the opera is linked to composers such as Georg Philipp Telemann, Heinrich Marschner and Albert Lortzing. The current opera house was completed in 1960 on Augustusplatz on the site of the New Theater, which was destroyed in the Second World War. The Gewandhaus Orchestra has played at all performances of the Leipzig Opera since 1840.

After the Old Opera House was destroyed by Leipzig's heaviest air raid in 1943 during World War II, the New Opera House was built from 1956-1960.

The Leipzig Opera House is the third oldest of its kind in Europe and looks back on more than 300 years of tradition.