Heidelberger Schlossfestspiele
The Heidelberg Castle Festival are the most famous and most visited open-air theater plays of North Baden. They take place in the courtyard or in other areas of the Heidelberg Castle every summer. Gerhard Stratthaus, the former finance minister of Baden-Württemberg, she called at the opening of 2001, a " cultural figurehead of the first order for the city and the region."
Organization
The Heidelberg Castle Festival organized by the city of Heidelberg Theatre. The local director is also the festival director. In the pre-war period also guest performances were integrated, but today is the festival management deliberately exclusively " in-house " productions.
History
The Heidelberg Castle Festival was launched in 1926 with a production of A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare to life. The following summer festival were successful; Gerhart Hauptmann and Thomas Mann were invited as guests of honor. In the late phase of the Weimar Republic ( ie of the world economic crisis in 1929 until Hitler 's seizure of power in 1933 ), however, the festival had to be discontinued for lack of funding.
In 1934 she was revitalized as a " kingdom Festival " and exploited ideologically Reich Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels. To make the idea from Heidelberg " a Salzburg Southwest Germany " (see below ), but at its core dated from the Weimar Republic. Between Shakespeare classics now Thing games ( Kurt Heynicke: Example The Way to the Reich) were mixed. Henry George, who already participated in the Weimar Republic, but had also arranged with the Nazi Reich, is a name that connects to the Heidelberg Castle Festival that time.
The Second World War is the cause of the setting of the Reich Festival in the summer of 1940; in the postwar period and the years of reconstruction, the tradition was not initially taken up again.
Only in 1974 there was a revival of the festival primarily as a tourist attraction. Popular with Americans Alt- Heidelberg musical The Student Prince (see also Heidelberg in poetry ), developed in the following years to become a classic. Director was Helmut Hein, who also sang the role of Prince - educator Dr. Engel in the early years. Hein staged the " Light Opera " by Hungarian composer Sigmund Romberg, who had been in the U.S. career until 2000.
With Günther Beelitz, who had become director in 2000, the concept changed. Instead touristy marketable Castle romance he sought a profound unity of the medieval core architecture as a backdrop to the contents of the pieces. Although there were still twice ( 2001 and 2002) based on performances of the play " Old Heidelberg " by Rudolf Meyer- Förster operetta directed by Ingo Waszerka. The effect, however, was not the old, because Beelitz had the venue moved within the castle grounds and thus reduces the area.
Successful new productions under the direction of Beelitz, which took into account his harmony concept were
- The Name of the Rose ( Umberto Eco ) and
- Carmina Burana ( Orff )
- Ronja the Robber's Daughter for children
Also, opera, dance theater and concerts have been added as a genre in the Schedule. Visitor numbers have risen sharply since the introduction of this concept, and reached in the 2005 season for the first time on the order of just under 30,000.
Since summer 2006, the Heidelberg Director Peter Spuhler was festival director of the Heidelberg Castle Festival. In 2010, standing next to the Heidelberg cult operetta " The Student Prince " and the opera " The Elixir of Love " and the tragedy of the famous Danish prince "Hamlet " and in thicknesses tower productions " Lovers & Crazy ," " Amphitryon " and " Wild Roses " on the program. There are also, as always, the castle concerts with the Philharmonic Orchestra. The children 's and youth theater is represented with his version of "Alice in Wonderland" and the dance-theater show "Rabbit is crying ."