Bucharest’s National Opera House

Versiune în română

Bucharest’s Opera House is the main venue for seeing opera and ballet performances in Bucharest. Their annual season runs from October to June and tickets are usually dirt cheap, a far cry from tickets to Madonna’s concert 🙂 They tend to stick to a classical repertoire. Due to lack of funding the sets are not too spectacular but performances are of a high quality. The edifice was built in the years 1952-1953 after the design by a group of architects led by Octav Doicescu. These were the first years of communism in Romania and the style condoned by the regime was called “socialist realism“, the official artistic movement of the Soviet Union. The socialist realism required an artificial return to the classical theme, away from the modernist tendencies of the day, which is why the Opera building has a neoclassical design. One example of the socialist realism touch, that can be seen in the photo, are the bas reliefs on the facade. The interior is in the tradition of the 18th century Italian Opera, with a central dome and three tiers of balconies. It can seat 1200 people. The inauguration of the new building of the Opera House was celebrated by a performance of Tchaikovsky’s Queen of Spades on January 9th, 1954 followed by the ballet Coppelia the following night.