Salzburg Marionettes

Programming / Around the World in Puppets.

Step 5 : Salzburg – Austria

I’ve never seen what I’m about to tell you about – but I would have loved to see it.

It is about marionettes and Opera.

The story begins in 1913, with a young Austrian sculptor, Anton Aicher. He loves working with wood and he loves opera voices. What does he do then? He carves marionettes – his beautiful friend has the voice of an angel – and this is the first performance of the Salzburg Marionette Theatre, Bastien and Bastienne, from Mozart.

It was for friends – the friends were so amazed that the story was permanently launched and continues to this day.

It’s opera, and not at all.
It’s a marionettes show – and you forget the marionettes so quickly.

It is exactly the perfect fusion point between these two artistic expressions.

It takes as long to become a puppeteer at the Salzburg Theatre as it does to become a musician.
It requires just as much dexterity
As much musical ability
As much love of music.

There is no “school” to learn this: it is the theatre itself that will teach you and allow you to become one of the dei ex machina.
This theatre is a real opera house: you will find seamstresses who make the costumes, wigmakers, set designers and of course, sculptors who will create puppets for each opera project to be staged.

Currently, the sculptor who lends his fingers and his soul is called Pierre Monnerat, he has notably created all the puppets for the Oberon show – need we say that each piece is a pure masterpiece?
Take a look :

As a result, when these extravagant and so serious geniuses of the living arts put themselves in the head to play with classical music, it gives a result as extravagant as brilliant.

For Fidelio, the major artistic choice was not to identify the faces – yes, they are almost human wooden dolls that move to Beethoven’s score.

As an introduction to classical music, frankly, it’s a beautiful introduction.

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Featured Image : from A Midsummer Night’s Dream by Salzburg Marionette Theatre