The Staatsoper Unter den Linden, also referred to as "Berlin State Opera", is a listed building on Unter den Linden boulevard in the historic center of Berlin. It was erected by order of Frederick the Great from 1741 to 1743 according to plans by Georg Wenzeslaus von Knobelsdorff in Palladian style. Damaged during the Allied bombing in World War II, the former Royal Prussian Opera House was rebuilt from 1951 to 1955 as part of the Forum Fridericianum square. Nicknamed Lindenoper, it is "the first theater anywhere to be, by itself, a prominent, freestanding monumental building in a city."
Peer Gynt is a five-act play in verse by the Norwegian dramatist Henrik Ibsen published in 1867. Written in Danish—the common written language of Denmark and Norway in Ibsen's lifetime—it is one of the most widely performed Norwegian plays. Ibsen believed Per Gynt, the Norwegian fairy tale on which the play is loosely based, to be rooted in fact, and several of the characters are modelled after Ibsen's own family, notably his parents Knud Ibsen and Marichen Altenburg. He was also generally inspired by Peter Christen Asbjørnsen's collection of Norwegian fairy tales, published in 1845.
Evelyn Shulman Lear was an American operatic soprano. Between 1959 and 1992, she appeared in more than forty operatic roles, appeared with every major opera company in the United States and won a Grammy Award in 1966. She was well known for her musical versatility, having sung all three main female roles in Der Rosenkavalier. Lear was also known for her work on 20th century pieces by Robert Ward, Alban Berg, Marvin David Levy, Rudolf Kelterborn and Giselher Klebe. She was married to the American bass-baritone Thomas Stewart until his death in 2006.
Gottfried von Einem was an Austrian composer. He is known chiefly for his operas influenced by the music of Stravinsky and Prokofiev, as well as by jazz. He also composed pieces for piano, violin and organ.
Peer Gynt is a play by Henrik Ibsen named for its main character, based on the fairy tale Per Gynt.
Werner Egk, born Werner Joseph Mayer, was a German composer.
Inge Borkh was a German operatic dramatic soprano. She was first based in Switzerland, where she received international attention when she appeared in the first performance in German of Menotti's The Consul, in Basel, in 1951. In 1952, Borkh became a member of the Deutsche Oper Berlin and the Bavarian State Opera in Munich. She appeared at leading opera houses in Europe and the Americas, and at festivals such as Bayreuth and Salzburg. Trained first as an actress, she was admired for both singing and stage presence, especially in the Richard Strauss roles Salome and Elektra. She also performed in contemporary opera, such as the premiere of Josef Tal's Ashmedai in Hamburg in 1971. Her recordings include complete operas and recitals. Borkh was awarded the Hans-Reinhart-Ring, the highest honour for theatre professionals in Switzerland.
Jan Koetsier was a Dutch composer and conductor.
Margarethe Arndt-Ober was a German opera singer who had an active international career during the first half of the twentieth century. A highly skilled contralto, Ober enjoyed a particularly long and fruitful association with the Berlin State Opera from 1907 to 1944. She also was notably a principal singer at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City between 1913 and 1917.
Friederike Sailer was a German soprano in opera and concert. She was a member of the Stuttgart Opera, later a voice teacher at the Musikhochschule Stuttgart. She performed at International festivals and recorded with conductors such as Marcel Couraud.
Kari Løvaas is a Norwegian operatic soprano who made an international career, mostly using the German spelling of her name, Kari Lövaas, outside Scandinavia. She has performed at international festivals such as the Salzburg Festival and the Lucerne Festival in both opera and concert. She participated in complete recordings of rarely performed operas, including works by Haydn and composers of the 20th century, has recorded Lieder and has regularly appeared in choral concerts.
Die Zaubergeige is a 1935 opera by Werner Egk to a libretto by Ludwig Strecker after Count Franz Pocci. Egk revised the opera in 1954.
Die Verlobung in San Domingo is a 1960 opera by Werner Egk after Heinrich von Kleist, premiered on 22 November 1963 at the Bavarian State Opera.
Irische Legende is a 1955 opera by Werner Egk who also wrote the libretto after the 1892/1899 verse drama The Countess Cathleen by W. B. Yeats. It premiered at the Salzburg Festival on 17 August 1955.
Columbus is a 1933 opera by Werner Egk. Originally a radio opera, Egk revised it in 1942 for the stage. The Munich premiere was acclaimed in the press and joined the year's repertoire at the Freiburg Theatre, though some dissented. The lack of melody in the opera brought negative comment from Richard Strauss in comparison to Meyerbeer's grand opera on the life of the Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama L'Africaine.
Circe is a 1945 opera by Werner Egk after Pedro Calderón de la Barca, premiered 1948. Egk reworked it as an opera semibuffa as 17 Tage und 4 Minuten, 1966.
Carla Henius was a German operatic soprano and mezzo-soprano, voice teacher and librettist. She played a decisive role in promoting recent works by composers such as Arnold Schönberg, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Luigi Nono for the stage. She wrote the libretto for an opera by Aribert Reimann.
Karl-Christian Kohn was a German opera singer (bass).
Mathieu Karl Maria Ahlersmeyer was a German operatic baritone and actor.
Ludwig Strecker Jr., also Ludwig Strecker der Jüngere, was a German music publisher, and an author of opera librettos which he wrote under the pen name Ludwig Andersen. He authored, and published through the Schott publishing house, two of the most successful German contemporary operas of the 1930s, Egk's Die Zaubergeige and Reutter's Doktor Johannes Faust.
