Stage direction

Peter Konwitschny

Peter Konwitschny is one of Germanyʼs most significant directors. Working mainly in the field of music theatre, he has been setting international standards with his productions for decades. His staged interpretations of the works of Handel, Gluck, Mozart, Wagner, Verdi, Tchaikovsky, Puccini, Strauss, Weill, Schönberg, Berg and Nono have made theatrical history.

The son of a conductor and a singer studied directing at the »Hanns Eisler« Academy of Music in Berlin and was an assistant director at the Berliner Ensemble under Ruth Berghaus from 1971 to 1979. Until 1985, he directed operas and operettas, and occasionally plays, in Budapest, Berlin, Rostock, Greifswald, Anklam, Altenburg and Halle. From 1986 to 1990 he worked as director at the Landestheater Halle, where his new conceptual approach in the stage interpretation of Handelʼs operas was pioneering for the rediscovery of these works as staged performances. Since 1990, Peter Konwitschny has worked as a freelance director in many cities in Germany and abroad, including Basel, Graz, Paris, Vienna, Barcelona, Copenhagen, Amsterdam, Bratislava, Lisbon, Moscow, Zürich, London, Tokyo and Stockholm.

From 1991 to 2007, he created various works at Oper Graz, which gained the theatre the title of »Opera House of the Year« in 2001. From 1998, in close collaboration with the conductor Ingo Metzmacher, he created eleven productions for the Hamburg State Opera, for which the theatre was named »Opera House of the Year« in 2005. From 2008 to 2011, Peter Konwitschny was Chief Director of the Leipzig Opera.

His more recent work includes Rihmʼs »Die Eroberung von Mexiko« at the Salzburg Festival, Mussorgskyʼs »Boris Godunow« at the Nuremberg State Theatre, Halévyʼs »La Juive« at the Opera Vlaanderen in Antwerp (recipient of the German »Faust« theatre prize  at the Mannheim National Theatre), Janáčekʼs »Věc Makropulos« at the Slovakian National Theatre of Bratislava plus Verdiʼs »Attila« and Egkʼs »Peer Gynt« at the Theater an der Wien. Alongside this, the recipient of many international prizes and bearer of the Federal Cross of Merit regularly teaches at German and international universities.

Peter Konwitschny is making his directorial debut at the Staatstheater am Gärtnerplatz with the operetta »Der tapfere Soldat«, after already creating a furore with productions in this genre such as »Die Csárdásfürstin« at the Semperoper Dresden and »Das Land des Lächelns« at the Komische Oper Berlin.