The National Academic Big Opera and Ballet Theatre of the Republic of Belarus is located in a park in the Trinity Banlieu of the city of Minsk

Minsk

- Ecological situation :The ecological situation is monitored by Republican Center of Radioactive and Environmental Control .During 2003–2008 the overall weight of contaminants increased from 186,000 to 247,400 tons. The change of gas as industrial fuel to mazut for financial reasons has worsened...

. Local people call it the "Opierny Teatr" (Belarusian) or the "Opera and Ballet Theatre". It opened on May 15, 1933 but it first didn't have its own building and performed at the Belarusian Drama Theatre building until 1938.

History

The first stationary theater was founded in Belarus in 1933 on the basis of the Belarusian opera and ballet school. The list of brilliant performances staged in the theater was opened with Bizet's Carmen. Several highly professional soloists and dancers were added to the troupe in the first few years at this location. "The Swan Lake", performed by K. Muller, was the first show on the scene of the new theater building. Theater's performances at the Decade of Belarusian Art in Moscow turned to be a great success. The theater didn't stop working even during the war (it worked in Nizhny Novgorod

Nizhny Novgorod

Nizhny Novgorod , colloquially shortened to Nizhny, is, with the population of 1,250,615, the fifth largest city in Russia, ranking after Moscow, St. Petersburg, Novosibirsk, and Yekaterinburg...

 till Minsk Liberation in 1944, than in Kovrov

Kovrov

Kovrov is a city and the administrative center of Kovrovsky District of Vladimir Oblast, Russia, situated on the right bank of the Klyazma River . Kovrov's population as of the preliminary results of the 2010 Census was 145,492; down from 155,499 recorded in the 2002 Census, and further down from...

).

During this time the repertoire was greatly enriched. The most famous operas staged in this theater are "Boris Godunov" by Modest Mussorgsky

Modest Mussorgsky

Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky was a Russian composer, one of the group known as 'The Five'. He was an innovator of Russian music in the romantic period...

, "Othello" and "Don Carlo" by Giuseppe Verdi

Giuseppe Verdi

Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...

, "Hoffman's Fairy Tales" by Jacques Offenbach

Jacques Offenbach

Jacques Offenbach was a Prussian-born French composer, cellist and impresario. He is remembered for his nearly 100 operettas of the 1850s–1870s and his uncompleted opera The Tales of Hoffmann. He was a powerful influence on later composers of the operetta genre, particularly Johann Strauss, Jr....

, "Sadko" and "Golden Cockerel" by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov

Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov

Nikolai Andreyevich Rimsky-Korsakov was a Russian composer, and a member of the group of composers known as The Five.The Five, also known as The Mighty Handful or The Mighty Coterie, refers to a circle of composers who met in Saint Petersburg, Russia, in the years 1856–1870: Mily Balakirev , César...

, "Lohengrin" by Richard Wagner

Richard Wagner

Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...

 and many other masterpieces of the world art. Nowadays you can see new interpretations of classical plays like "Carmen" and "Boris Godunov" as well as traditional performances.

Today

The theater tours a lot and is welcomed in many countries all over the world. In Spain, Russia, Germany, Poland, Switzerland, Israel, Portugal, China opera admirers are well acquainted with the repertoire of this Belarus theater. The theater's participation in the well-known annual festival in Germany called Classic Open Air has already become traditional. It should be mentioned, that in 1996 State Theater was divided in two independent theaters: National Academic Bolshoi Ballet Theatre of the Republic of Belarus and National Academic Opera Theatre of Belarus.

Building

Current theater building was opened in 1939. It was designed by Belarus architect Joseph Langbard. His original design was only partially implemented and some design details were omitted yielding to financial and other problems.

The theatre building has relief

Relief

Relief is a sculptural technique. The term relief is from the Latin verb levo, to raise. To create a sculpture in relief is thus to give the impression that the sculpted material has been raised above the background plane...

s by Zair Azgur

Zair Azgur

Zair Isaakovich Azgur was a Belarusian sculptor active during the Soviet period. Born in the Vitebsk region, he studied in that city from 1922 to 1925; from 1925 until 1928 he studied at the Vkhutein in Leningrad. He first exhibited in 1923. He was mainly active in Minsk, where among his...

.

It was recently renovated and reopened in 2009. Many sculptures were added around the theater, its stage was slightly moved and audience space expanded. The latest theater lighting and motion equipment was added while adhering to the original design by Joseph Langbard.

External links

• Belarus National Theater of Opera and Ballet (in Russian)