Vienna Festival 2016

(Image source: www.wien.info)

From 13 May, the Vienna Festival will be showing six weeks of contemporary stage art: 36 productions from 25 countries, from drama to dance and opera, accompanied by a series of concerts in the Musikverein.

The opening of the Vienna Festival takes place at Vienna's City Hall Square on 13 May. The free open-air concert has delighted thousands of people year after year and is broadcast around the world. The center for artists and audiences during the festival is the Künstlerhaus.

The Vienna Festival will focus on new productions of popular classics as well as premieres of contemporary works by international directors. Artists and ensembles from around the world present celebrated works, often in the original language. Audiences can look forward with excitement to four premieres in 2016. Other highlights include:

The new production of Beethoven's great opera of liberation Fidelio by the Russian director Dmitri Tcherniakov – with Marc Minkowski conducting at Theater an der Wien.

The sensation of Moscow's theater scene comes to Vienna with Konstantin Bogomolov's production of An Ideal Husband, a furious social satire based on Oscar Wilde's stage play.

Director Frank Castorf presents Tschewengur. Die Wanderung mit offenem Herzen – his stage adaptation of Andrei Platonov's novel about a journey through the Russian steppe (picture).

Corinna Harfouch can be seen as a white clown in the powerful variety show Der Auftrag. Erinnerung an eine Revolution.

Jan Fabre shows a 24-hour theater marathon entitled Mount Olympus.

Mezzosoprano Anne Sofie von Otter sings in Christoph Marthaler's theatrical evening of song Isoldes Abendbrot.