Our afternoon, weekend and holiday offerings give children, teenagers and families an opportunity to try stuff out and pursue their own creative ideas. We provide you with almost boundless scope to discover new skills, develop existing talents, probe new realms of self-identity and find a platform from which to express your own art! In our workshops artists and drama teachers go about the task of reinventing, with you, the world of musical theatre. 

Current announcements, dates, offers and recommendations are announced via our website, the regularly published newsletters "Family" and "Youth" and via Instagram. Stay informed! 

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Our opera family project is aimed at families with children who have not yet experienced opera. Children, parents, grandparents - and whoever else is part of the family - have the opportunity to experience rehearsal visits, musical workshops and musical productions together free of charge. In cooperation with your family centre, you will get to know the opera for children in front of and behind the stage.

The programme is aimed at families with children up to 6 years of age.

Participation is free of charge

Supported by the Heinz and Heide Dürr Foundation

 

 

 

Project management Carolin Eichhorst
Music education workshops Christina von Nell and Letizia Massetti

If you are interested and would like to make an appointment, please send us an email!

opernfamilien@deutscheoperberlin.de

The Opernmäuse ('opera mice') are back and they're taking over the opera house! Looking, listening, learning..., they're peeking behind the scenes, taking tours and workshops, being asked for their impressions at rehearsals of our children's productions and generally peering and probing into every nook and cranny of the Opera. All we can say is: Go for it!

10 dates [October 2023 - July 2024].
The children must already be 6 or a maximum of 10 years old by 1 September, the programme takes place without the accompaniment of parents.
Applications will be possible again from September 2024.

One-time costs for the entire season: 
€ 50,- normal price / € 10,- reduced price.
for families with proof of eligibility ("berlinpass")

In our children's club, the participating children become researchers who explore the mini-verse of opera and its surroundings. What is that big opera spaceship hovering in Charlottenburg's neighbourhood? Who are the people who work in this spaceship or live next to it? We will collect stories, sounds and melodies and use them to create a listening experience that we will present before the summer break.

Dates from September 
Wednesdays from 16.30-18.30.

Participation is free of charge.

The children's club is supported by Arend and Brigitte Oetker.

In cooperation with the RambaZamba Theatre, 22 Berlin young people aged 13-18 with and without disabilities will spend eight months exploring the theme of feelings in the context of opera together with teachers and artists. The young people will present the results of their work in the form of their own musical theatre production in the Tischlerei of the Deutsche Oper Berlin in early April 2024.

Artistic-pedagogical direction Kirsten Burger
Music workshops Misha Cvijović
Movement workshops Fernando Balsera Pita
Stage design workshops Julia Krenz
Costume workshops Carlotta Dering and Marlene van Dieken

Rehearsals take place on Tuesdays
always from 16.30- 19.00 hrs .

Participation is free of charge.

"Feelings - Now" is funded by "Zur Bühne", the support programme of the German Stage Association within the framework of "Kultur macht stark. Alliances for Education".

 

During the winter holiday week, young people develop their own music and texts and present the results at the end of the week in the foyer of the Deutsche Oper Berlin.

Cooperation in planning with the Haus der Poesie a. o.

On individual Saturday afternoons, the doors leading backstage are opened for children accompanied by adults.

Here you can discover how opera is made!

Cost: € 5,– per person

For adults who would like to experience an opera together with children, we offer playful workshops on weekends for joint preparation.

 

The age recommendations for the workshops are based on the respective operas.

Cost: € 5,– per person

 

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Newsletter

04
DEC

Adventskalender im Foyer: Das 4. Fensterchen

African American Spirituals
with Christian Simmons and John Parr
5.00 p.m. / Rang-Foyer right
Duration: approx. 25 minutes / admission free


In Germany, it is still little known today that, parallel to the development of the European song, the spiritual in the USA looks back on a tradition that goes back to the 17th century. Created during the oppression of slavery as songs of labour, freedom, play, lamentation, celebration or lullabies, African-American spirituals form the starting point for gospel, blues and ultimately also for jazz, R&B and African-American music in general. Spirituals are characterised by their rhythmic finesse, which includes counter-rhythms, polyrhythms and syncopation. The tonality is characterised by microtonality, pentatonic scales and the varied use of the singing voice. All these elements suggest that the influences of African music, as brought to America by slaves, have survived over the centuries, mostly passed down orally, to this day.


The bass-baritone Christian Simmons, originally from Washington D.C., was a member of the Cafritz Young Artists of the Washington National Opera in the 2022/23 season and joined the ensemble of the Deutsche Oper Berlin as a scholarship holder of the Opera Foundation New York in the 2023/24 season. Over the course of the season, he will appear in roles such as Lord Rochefort / ANNA BOLENA, 2nd Harnischter / DIE ZAUBERFLÖTE, Pinellino / GIANNI SCHICCHI, Brabantischer Edler / LOHENGRIN, Oberpriester des Baal / NABUCCO and Sciarrone / TOSCA. Simmons is the district winner of the Metropolitan Opera's 2022/23 Eric and Dominique Laffont Competition, winner of the 2017 Harlem Opera Theater Vocal Competition, winner of the 2016 National Association of Teaching Singing (NATS) Regional Competition, and an Honorary Life Member of the Coalition for African Americans in the Performing Arts (CAAPA). A graduate of Morgan State University and the Maryland Opera Studio, Simmons is a member of the nation's first and largest music fraternity, Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia Fraternity of America.

John Parr was born in Birmingham in 1955 and studied at Manchester University and at the Royal Northern College of Music with Sulamita Aronovsky. He won prizes as a solo pianist at international competitions in Barcelona and Vercelli and was a member of Yehudi Menuhin's "Live Music Now". From 1985 to 1988 he was a guest repetiteur at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden and worked for the Scottish Opera in Glasgow from 1989 to 1991. He came to Germany in 1991 and was Head of Studies and Musical Assistant to the General Music Director in Hanover. In 2000, Pamela Rosenberg and Donald Runnicles brought him to San Francisco Opera as Head of Music Staff. From 2002 to 2005, he was musical assistant at the Bayreuth Festival. From 2011 to 2014, he was casting director and assistant to the general music director at the Staatstheater Karlsruhe. Since August 2014, John Parr has been working at the Deutsche Oper Berlin, initially as Head of Studies and since 2018 as Head Coach.