Leipzig Opera

The Leipzig Opera was founded in 1693, when the first opera house was built on the Brühl (now Ritterpassage). For various reasons, it soon closed down. A new building, the Comödienhaus, was built in 1766 on Rannische Bastei (now Richard-Wagner-Platz). Here, operas were staged until 1817, when the building was rebuilt in a classic amphitheatre style. The premieres of numerous Romantic operas were given here, from 1840 featuring the Gewandhaus Orchestra, since the Leipzig Opera did not have its own orchestra. In 1868, another opera house opened, the Neues Theater, on the northern frontage of Augustusplatz, on the site of the present-day Opera. The Neues Theater, destroyed by bombs in 1943, was reopened as the Leipzig Opera in its new architectural form in October 1960.