The Hamburg State Opera (in German: Staatsoper Hamburg) is a German opera

company based in Hamburg. Its theatre is located near the square of Gänsemarkt. Since
2015, the current Intendant of the company is Georges Delnon, and the current
Generalmusikdirektor of the company is Kent Nagano.

Contents
● 1 History
● 2 General Music Directors (GMD)
● 3 See also
● 4 References
● 5 External links

History
See also: Opera in German

Opera in Hamburg dates to 2 January 1678 when the Oper am Gänsemarkt was
inaugurated with a performance of a biblical Singspiel by Johann Theile. It was not a court
theatre but the first public opera house in Germany established by the art-loving citizens of
Hamburg, a prosperous member of the Hanseatic League.

The Hamburg Bürgeroper resisted the dominance of the Italianate style and rapidly became
the leading musical center of the German Baroque. In 1703, George Friedrich Handel was
engaged as violinist and harpsichordist and performances of his operas were not long in
appearing. In 1705, Hamburg gave the world première of his opera Nero.

In 1721, Georg Philipp Telemann, a central figure of the German Baroque, joined the
Hamburg Opera, and in subsequent years Christoph Willibald Gluck, Johann Adolph Hasse
and various Italian companies were among the guests.

The Stadt-Theater, built in 1827

The same building, redecorated in 1890, destroyed in 1943

To replace the aging wooden structure, the first stone was laid on 18 May 1826 for the Stadt-
Theater on the present-day site of the Hamburg State Opera. The new theater, with seating
for 2,800 guest, was inaugurated less than a year later with Beethoven's incidental music to
Egmont.

In 1873, both the exterior and interior of the structure were renovated in the reigning
"Gründerzeit" style of the time, and again in 1891, when electric lighting was introduced.

Under the direction of Bernhard Pollini, the house mounted its first complete Ring Cycle in
1879. In 1883, the year of Wagner's death, a cycle comprising nine of his operas
commenced. The musical directors Hans von Bülow (from 1887 to 1890) and Gustav Mahler
(from 1891 to 1897) also contributed to the fame of the opera house.

In the beginning of the 20th century, opera was an important part of the theatre's repertoire;
among the 321 performances during the 1907–08 season, 282 were performances of opera.
The Stadt-Theater performed not only established repertoire but also new works, such as
Paul Hindemith's Sancta Susanna, Igor Stravinsky's The Soldier's Tale, Ernst Krenek's
Jonny spielt auf, and Leoš Janáček's Jenůfa. Ferruccio Busoni's Die Brautwahl (1912) and
Erich Wolfgang Korngold's Die tote Stadt (1920) both had their world premieres in Hamburg.
In the 1930s, after Hitler came to power, the opera house was renamed Hamburgische
Staatsoper.