Bregenzer Festspiele

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Bregenzer Festspiele (Bregenz Festival) is a performing arts festival which is held every July and August in Bregenz Austria.

Founded in 1946, the festival presents a wide variety of musical and theatrical events in several venues:

Seebühne (or Lake Stage), with 7,000 seats, is the location for large-scale opera or musical performances on a floating stage on the shores of Lake Constance.

Opera or musical productions on the lake stage generally tend to come from the popular operatic repertoire, and have included Il trovatore by Giuseppe Verdi in 2005-2006; West Side Story by Leonard Bernstein in 2003-2004; and La bohème by Giacomo Puccini in 2001-2002.

Festspielhaus presents performances of rarely performed opera and concerts.
Werkstattbühne presents performances of contemporary theatre and opera.
Theater am Kornmarkt presents operetta.
Martinsplatz, the open-air medieval square is the venue for drama performances.

Since December 2003, David Pountney has been the leader of the festival.

In 2004, the festival offered about 80 performances that drew an audience of over 215,000.