Before Bayreuth welcomed its first pilgrims or Verona set its spectacles under the stars, Munich had already begun its tradition of celebrating opera each summer. Founded in 1875 under the patronage of King Ludwig II, the Münchner Opernfestspiele is the world’s oldest continuously running opera festival.

The festival’s 150^th edition, which runs through July 31 offers an ambitious mix of revivals and new productions drawn from the Bayerische Staatsoper’s regular season. The Opernfestspiele can be understood as the culmination of the season of one of Europe’s busiest repertoire companies: a five-week retrospective, intensification, and reframing of what’s come before.

Thematic cohesion has long been central to Munich’s summer season, and this year’s programming is unified by a broad yet fertile idea: myth. The concept provides an interpretive through-line connecting operas from the Baroque era through the Romantic and into the psychologically wrought modernist canon.

This year’s festival opened on June 27 with a new staging of “Don Giovanni” directed by David Hermann and conducted by Vladimir Jurowski that completed the company’s new Da Ponte trilogy. A second festival premiere, premiering tonight, is Gabriel Fauré’s seldom-staged “Pénélope,” which explores the Homeric narrative from a female perspective. Andrea Breth directs and Susanna Mälkki conducts.

Elsewhere, myth finds expression in Richard Strauss’s lush and overlooked “Die Liebe der Danae;” in a new production by Claus Guth; in the return of Kornél Mundruczó’s staging of “Lohengrin;” Tobias Kratzer’s acclaimed take on “Das Rheingold;” and in Krzysztof Warlikowski’s provocative pairing of Purcell’s “Dido and Aeneas” with Schoenberg’s “Erwartung,” an evening that merges ancient tragedy with modernist alienation.

Ahead of the “Pénélope” premiere, OperaWire sat down with Serge Dorny, the Bayerische Staatsoper’s Intendant, to discuss the Opernfestspiele as it turns 150.

OperaWire: Maybe 10 years ago, when I spoke to your predecessor, Nikolaus Bachler, he said something interesting. He told me that when he planned out the season, he started with the Opernfestspiele. Is that how you work, as well?

Serge Dorny: For me, the Opernfestspiele is anything but an afterthought, it’s a cornerstone. When I begin planning the season, my starting point is always the premieres. I work to develop a strong thematic concept, a kind of narrative arc that connects these productions. This is especially important within a repertory system, where it’s crucial that each season feels distinctive, a sort of “millésime,” if you will.

Once that arc is in place, I consider how to extend or complete it during the Opernfestspiele. The idea is to bring together the premieres from the season and complement them with two new productions created specifically for the festival, along with a selection of revivals that are thematically connected. This way, the festival becomes dramaturgically coherent (a micro-season in its own right) rather than simply a cluster of performances or a pretext for higher ticket prices.

So while the thematic structure of the season is the true point of departure, the festival plays a vital and early role in shaping the overall vision. It has to offer something singular, something that gives the season its final resonance.

OW: It’s not business as usual.

SD: A festival, any festival, cannot be business as usual. It has to be dramaturgically and thematically conceived, and it must carry a sense of urgency. That’s why the Opernfestspiele doesn’t just revive the premieres of the season; it also includes two new productions created specifically for the festival. This year, for example, we opened with a new “Don Giovanni,” and later in July, we present Gabriel Fauré’s “Pénélope” at the Prinzregententheater.

But a festival isn’t just a showcase of greatest hits, it’s not about rehashing the familiar canon. It must be ephemeral and exceptional, shaped by bold repertoire choices and the desire to provoke thought and discovery. A festival should spark curiosity, surprise audiences, and open new perspectives through juxtaposition and dialogue between works. That’s why it’s so important to include pieces that are lesser-known or rarely performed. In recent years, we’ve presented Ligeti’s “Le Grand Macabre,” Penderecki’s “The Devils of Loudun,” and Brett Dean’s “Hamlet,” works that perfectly embody what a festival can and should be: daring, inquisitive, and revelatory.

This year, the thematic arc of the festival revolves around myth and archetype. It’s a thread that runs through the entire program. We have “Dido and Aeneas” and “Pénélope,” both centered on figures shaped by the Trojan War. We explore Slavic mythology with “Rusalka,” and Germanic legend with “Das Rheingold.” Even “Don Giovanni” belongs to this world, he is the archetypal seducer, a figure who has echoed through literature and music for centuries.

These works speak across time, revealing how myths continue to resonate, evolve, and reflect our own contemporary questions. In a world marked by war, displacement, ecological crisis, and moral ambiguity, myths offer not just escape but a framework for confronting timeless human dilemmas, power, identity, sacrifice, and resilience. They allow us to process collective trauma and imagine the ethical contours of the future.

OW: The Opernfestspiele is turning 150 this year, which makes it the oldest continually running opera festival on earth, even if it skipped a few years here and there due to war and other catastrophes. It predates the Bayreuth Festival by a single year. Would it be fair to say that the Opernfestspiele began as a challenge to Wagner, who was trying to get his own festival off the ground? How has it changed over time?

SD: The Intendant in 1875 was Karl von Perfall, who had a rather fraught relationship with Richard Wagner. If you look at the events surrounding the world premiere of “Das Rheingold” in 1869, you’ll see the extent of the conflict. Wagner didn’t want the piece performed at all before the full Ring cycle was ready. His vision was to present the tetralogy as a unified whole in his own festival, which he was then trying to establish in Bayreuth.

Initially, Hans Richter was scheduled to conduct the premiere. But after the dress rehearsal, he wrote to Wagner, urging him to help postpone the performance, convinced the work wasn’t stage-ready. Wagner supported him, even writing to King Ludwig II to try to delay the premiere and lobbying for Karl von Perfall’s dismissal. As a result, Hans Richter was removed and replaced by Franz Wüllner, who ultimately conducted the premiere. But Ludwig held the rights to the score, so the performance in Munich went ahead, much to Wagner’s frustration.

I mention all this because von Perfall was also the one who laid the groundwork for the Festspiele in Munich. His ambition wasn’t simply to create a local summer event. He wanted to position the Bayerische Staatsoper as a cultural beacon, attracting both national and international audiences. Perhaps there was even a sense of wanting to preempt Wagner, be first in establishing a permanent opera festival model. And interestingly, it wasn’t just opera that featured in the early years. The festival also included spoken theater, with companies invited from cities like Berlin and beyond. It had a much broader cultural remit from the beginning.

Financial sustainability was a challenge, especially early on. The festival faced interruptions, not only during wars, but also in peacetime due to budgetary issues. Yet over time, it grew in stature. In different periods, it developed a more focused artistic identity, centering on specific composers such as Mozart, Richard Strauss, and of course, Wagner.

One striking example of this was in 1988, when Wolfgang Sawallisch curated a kind of “festival within the festival” devoted entirely to Richard Strauss. He presented all of Strauss’s stage works (some staged, some concertante) a major artistic statement that reflected the ambition and depth the Opernfestspiele can achieve.

It’s also notable that not long after the founding of Bayreuth in 1876, Munich began to position itself as a parallel site for Wagner’s work. Already in the 1880s and 1890s, Wagner’s operas had become central to the festival’s programming. That was likely a deliberate move. And while Bayreuth is often seen as the sacred ground of Wagner performance, its early years were anything but continuous. In that sense, Munich’s Opernfestspiele, with its longer history and ability to evolve, represents a unique legacy in the festival world.

OW: Which brings me to my next question: What sets the Münchner Opernfestspiele apart from Europe’s other major summertime opera festivals, including Salzburg, Bayreuth and Aix?

SD: The big difference has to do with the nature of the festival. What we offer here in terms of repertoire is much wider and broader than what you find in any of those other places. This year, for instance, you have 11 opera productions, three ballet productions, you have symphony concerts and chamber music, all over a period of five weeks. So it’s a totally different scale.

OW: Does it make sense to speak of competition between Munich and Salzburg or Munich and Bayreuth, even in terms of healthy competition? Do you coordinate with Katharina [Wagner] or [Markus] Hinterhäuser?

SD: I don’t think in terms of competition. For me, it’s more a matter of dialogue and differentiation. Each festival has its own identity, its own DNA. Ours is inseparable from the character of the Bayerische Staatsoper as a repertoire house with a long tradition of innovation. That context gives the Opernfestspiele a completely different profile.

If you look back at the history of this house, it has always been a crucible for new ideas. It has never been afraid to take risks. Think of Richard Strauss, who was just 30 when he became music director here, not yet the towering figure he would become. Likewise, Hans Knappertsbusch and Georg Solti were both in their mid-thirties when they began shaping the artistic direction of this theater.

Innovation is part of our institutional identity and so is authorship. This house has helped write opera history. Mozart composed “Idomeneo” and “La finta giardiniera” here. Wagner had five of his operas premiered in Munich. And although Richard Strauss is closely associated with Dresden, he gave us “Capriccio.”

This year’s Opernfestspiele honors that legacy with a program that reflects both tradition and thematic depth. The festival opened with “Don Giovanni”—arguably the opera of all operas—followed by “Das Rheingold,” the prelude to Wagner’s Ring cycle, and later “Die Liebe der Danae,” one of Richard Strauss’s final and most profound works. These operas, though composed in vastly different eras, enter into a powerful dialogue. “Rheingold” explores the renunciation of love in the pursuit of power; “Danae,” by contrast, examines love tested by the seduction of wealth. When presented together, these works reveal striking thematic continuities, across centuries, styles, and sensibilities, offering fresh insight into enduring human dilemmas.

So yes, we look to the past, but always in a spirit of renewal. The festival is not only a celebration, it’s a place of rediscovery. We try to bring misunderstood or forgotten works back into the conversation and let them speak to our time. In that sense, the Münchner Opernfestspiele, and the Staatsoper as a whole, stands for artistic courage, curiosity, and continuity. It’s a house that has never stood still.

OW: And, at the risk of stating the obvious, a crucial difference between the Opernfestspiele and your neighbors like Bayreuth and Salzburg is that you’re able to cast the festival productions from your extraordinary ensemble.

SD: Yes, and that’s very much part of the DNA of this house. The true quality of an opera company isn’t measured only by the big names it attracts, but by the level of artistry in every role, even the smallest ones. Of course, we need the great artists, the stars of the opera world. But the strength of a company reveals itself in how it casts the minor parts. That’s where the depth of the ensemble becomes visible.

Take “Die Liebe der Danae,” for example. The roles of the Four Queens and the Four Kings are by no means easy, and we were able to cast them entirely from within our ensemble. That requires a certain artistic capital, having the vocal and dramatic resources already in-house. And I think that’s something that truly defines the Bayerische Staatsoper: a strong, versatile ensemble capable of carrying both major and supporting roles with equal commitment and quality.

OW: Let’s talk a bit about the directors that you invite to work at the house.

SD: For me, it’s essential to offer a broad spectrum of theatrical aesthetics—always at the highest level. If you look at recent seasons, we’ve worked with a wide range of directors: Jetske Mijnssen, Lotte de Beer, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, Benedict Andrews, Claus Guth, Kornél Mundruczó, and Krzysztof Warlikowski, among others. It’s a diverse group, and deliberately so.

But it’s not just about bringing in well-known names. What matters is giving directors works that speak to them, pieces that resonate with their own theatrical language, their “Theatersprache.” And you have to be ready to go on that journey with them. Directing opera isn’t just about inspiration; it’s about deep intellectual engagement and real craft (“Handwerk”).

It’s also important to recognize that not every production makes sense in a 2,000-seat theater like the Nationaltheater. That’s why we make full use of our other venues: the Prinzregententheater, the Cuvilliés-Theater, and the Utopia Reithalle. It was in the Reithalle, for instance, that Lotte van den Berg directed Matsukaze during our Ja, Mai festival. Each space allows for a different kind of theatrical experience, and we try to match the work to the room it needs.

OW: With all that in mind, how did you choose “Pénélope” as the second Festspiele-Premiere and how did you assemble your creative team?

SD: For an institution like the Bayerische Staatsoper, I believe we have a responsibility not only to preserve the operatic canon but also to revive and reintroduce forgotten or underappreciated works. Gabriel Fauré’s “Pénélope” is precisely that kind of piece. It offers something entirely different from what audiences might expect from grand opera. Of course, Fauré was deeply influenced by Wagner, but “Pénélope” inhabits a completely different sound world. Calling it an “antidote” to Wagner wouldn’t be quite right, but it is, in many ways, the aesthetic opposite of the spectacular, the flamboyant, or the opulent. It’s restrained, inward-looking, and poetic.

Many people today, if they know Fauré at all, tend to associate him with early 20th-century Impressionism, placing him alongside Claude Debussy or Maurice Ravel. But that doesn’t quite capture his full trajectory. Fauré was born in 1845, while Berlioz was composing “La Damnation de Faust,” and he died in 1924, just as the world was absorbing “Wozzeck.” So he spans an extraordinary period in music history. He is what the Germans would call a “Wegbereiter,” a forerunner who helped prepare the path toward modernism.

His musical education was shaped by a rigidly conservative environment. He studied church music at the École Niedermeyer, where contemporary composers like Schumann, Liszt, and Wagner were excluded from the curriculum. It was only thanks to his teacher, Camille Saint-Saëns, that he was eventually exposed to that broader world of Romantic music. Yet even then, Fauré followed his own path. Even later in life, when he became director of the very institution that had once restricted him (the Paris Conservatoire) he remained gently but firmly against the artistic mainstream.

You can hear that independent spirit in all of his music. Take the “Requiem,” for example. It’s the complete opposite of Berlioz’s, there’s nothing theatrical or triumphal about it. It’s austere, mystical, and deeply introspective.

In “Pénélope,” melody and harmony are central, while orchestration is used with great subtlety, never for show. Like Wagner, Fauré employs a through-composed structure (“durchkomponiert”) and makes use of leitmotifs. But unlike Wagner’s, Fauré’s motifs are not overt symbols, they are organically woven into the fabric of the music. They help give the opera a sense of classical structure, even as the music remains fluid and atmospheric.

There’s also a thematic resonance with Debussy’s “Pelléas et Mélisande,” which we staged last year. Both operas inhabit a world of psychological depth, ambiguity, and emotional restraint. In that sense, “Pénélope” continues a line of inquiry we’ve been pursuing here, into works that speak softly, but profoundly.

OW: Another famous antidote to Wagner.

SD: Exactly. And in that spirit, it’s quite interesting that “Pénélope” marks Andrea Breth’s debut at the Bayerische Staatsoper. When I first approached her about directing the piece, she was initially hesitant, she didn’t know the opera. But once she listened to the score, she was completely captivated. The psychological depth and emotional restraint of the music spoke to her immediately.

Susanna Mälkki, who conducts the premiere, has long had a deep affinity for this kind of repertoire. It’s a score that suits her artistic sensibility perfectly, refined, textural, emotionally complex.

The opera itself is substantial. Beyond the central roles of Penelope and Ulysses, you also have the chorus of suitors and the queen’s maids. It’s a large cast, but what’s especially compelling is the perspective: the story is told through Penelope’s eyes. It’s about waiting, endurance, suppressed emotion. She is steadfast, but the opera doesn’t ignore the cost of that strength. Fauré’s orchestra becomes the inner voice, the canvas for her psyche. The emotional tension lives in the music, often more than in the text.

OW: The 2024–25 season began in October with Tobias Kratzer’s “Rheingold,” which also closes out this year’s Opernfestspiele in July. But we’ll have to wait quite a while for “Walküre,” which won’t arrive until June 25, 2026, to open the 151st Opernfestspiele. Why the long pause?

SD: We chose to begin with “Rheingold,” separated from the rest of the Ring because it functions as the Vorabend—the “preliminary evening” of the Ring. Musically and structurally, it’s quite different from the three operas that follow. “Rheingold” is like a prologue: more linear, less psychologically fragmented.

We then decided to group the main trilogy, “Walküre,” “Siegfried,” and “Götterdämmerung,” more tightly. So, “Walküre” will open the 2026 festival. “Siegfried” will follow as the season opener in fall 2026, and “Götterdämmerung” will premiere during the 2027 Opernfestspiele, at which point we’ll present the full Ring cycle.

So yes, there’s a wait of about a year and a half between “Rheingold” and “Walküre,” but after that, the rest of the cycle unfolds quite rapidly, almost within the span of twelve months.