The Royal Opera was formed as the Covent Garden
Opera Company in 1946, but behind it lies a tradition of
operatic performance which goes back for more than 260 years at
its home in Covent Garden. In each of the three theatres there
have been on the site since 1732, opera has played an important
role.
The present theatre was built in 1858. During World War II it
was used as a dance hall but after the war the idea of public
subsidy of the arts was accepted and the decision was made to
establish the Royal Opera House as the permanent year-round home
of the opera and ballet companies now known as The Royal Opera
and The Royal Ballet. It was the ballet company which reopened
the building on 20 February 1946 with The Sleeping Beauty. The
two Companies combined for Purcell's The Fairy Queen that
December, and on 14 January 1947, Covent Garden Opera Company
gave its first complete opera performance, Bizet's Carmen.
Over the last two decades The Royal Opera has enlarged its
reputation with an imaginative range of repertory and
award-winning new productions. These have included the British
première of Berio's Un re in ascolto, the first productions at
Covent Garden of Borodin's Prince Igor, Janácek's The Cunning
Little Vixen and Kát'a Kabanová, Rossini's Guillaume Tell and Il
viaggio a Reims, Mozart's Mitridate, re di Ponto, Berlioz's La
damnation de Faust and Prokofiev's The Fiery Angel. The
Company's commitment to contemporary opera was seen in the world
première of Harrison Birtwistle's opera Gawain in 1991, and the
world premiere of Nicholas Maw's Sophie's Choice in December
2002. The recording of Gawain won the Contemporary Category of
the 1996 Gramophone Awards.
Hotels Near the Royal Opera House
Kingsway
Hall Hotel
Great Queen Street, Holborn, Camden, London
Rooms from: £75.00
(Distance: 0.2m)
Thistle
Charing Cross
The Strand, City of Westminster, London
Rooms from: £100.00
(Distance: 0.3m)
Thistle Bloomsbury
Bloomsbury Way, Camden, London
Rooms from: £129.00
(Distance: 0.3m)
St
Georges Hotel
14-15 Langham Place, City of Westminster, London
Rooms from: £88.00
(Distance: 0.3m)
Gresham Hotel Bloomsbury
36 Bloomsbury Street, Bloomsbury, Camden, London
Rooms from: £40.00
(Distance: 0.3m)
Hazlitts
6 Frith Street, Soho, City of Westminster, London
Rooms from: £169.00
(Distance: 0.4m)
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