The Saaremaa Opera Festival (Estonia), a major event which will take place from 23 to 27 July 2024, has chosen Fundació Òpera Catalunya as its guest company. FOC will present a total of 5 different productions over the course of 5 days: Puccini’s Tosca and Manon Lescaut, Bizet’s Carmen (flamenco ballet version), Verdi’s Il trovatore, and a lyric gala with the most representative works of the Catalan and Spanish repertoires.

Together with the soloists leading the casts, Cor Amics de l’Òpera de Sabadell and Orquestra Simfònica del Vallès will be the protagonists of the festival. This is a very exciting challenge for the company and a magnificent opportunity for international recognition.

About the Festival

The Saaremaa Opera Festival is a renowned event that is held annually at the medieval castle of Kuressaare, one of western Estonia’s foremost tourist attractions. Each year the festival draws some 20,000 spectators from around the world. From its beginning in 1999, it has acquired a steadily growing place in the cultural life of Estonia, becoming the country’s event with the largest domestic and international attendance.

The Saaremaa Opera Festival offers performances by recognised international opera theatres. Since the year 2008, it is organised by Eesti Kontsert, a state-run company that is the leading music promoter in Estonia and that also manages the four main auditoriums there. Its artistic director is Arne Mikk.

The Festival has previously hosted the Black American Opera (USA, 2008), the Latvian National Opera (2009), the Stanislavsky and Nemerovich-Dantshenko Moscow Academic Music Theatre (2010), the Ankara State Opera and Ballet Theatre (2011), the Moscow Helikon Opera (2012, 2019), companies from Tbilisi, Kutaisi and Batumi (Georgia, 2013), the Ukranian National Opera (2014), the Teatro di Milano (Italy, 2015), the Wrocław Opera (Poland, 2016), the Krefeld-Mönchengladbach Theatre (Germany, 2017), the Shanghai Opera Theatre, the Vanemuine Theatre and Hungarian State Opera (2018), the St. Petersburg Chamber Opera (Russia, 2021) and the Silesian Opera (Bytom, Poland, 2022).

The Festival’s 2023 edition took place from 25 to 29 July and its guest company was the Maria Bieșu National Opera and Ballet Theatre of Chişinău (Moldavia).

+ info:

https://concert.ee/en/festivals/saaremaa-opera-festival/

https://saaremaaopera.com/