Berlin State Opera Orchestra

The origins of the Berlin State Opera trace back to Elector Joachim II’s creation of the “Kurfurstliche Hofkapelle” (Electoral Court Ensemble), which received its formal organization in 1570. By the opening decades of the seventeenth century the ensemble had expanded to thirty-seven musicians and ranked among Europe’s largest orchestras, yet the Thirty Years’ War reduced its forces to seven players. Recovery proceeded gradually, the group reconstituting itself chiefly as a string ensemble. Elector Friedrich III founded Berlin’s first permanent opera company in 1696 and assigned the Hofkapelle to serve as its resident orchestra.

When Brandenburg became the Kingdom of Prussia in 1701, the Elector assumed the title King Friedrich I; the musical body was then enlarged and redesignated the “Königliche Kapelle” (Royal Ensemble). Upon King Friedrich Wilhelm I’s accession in 1713, however, the ensemble contracted once more, surviving only as a modest brass band for hunting parties and military parades.

Under the succeeding monarch, Friedrich II (Frederick the Great), distinguished musicians such as Quantz and C.P.E. Bach were engaged as Kapellmeister. The monarch’s elegant Royal Opera House on Unter den Linden, completed in 1742, remained reserved exclusively for court and military audiences. Although fire and warfare have repeatedly destroyed the building, each reconstruction has restored it to its role as home of both the opera company and its orchestra.

Public concerts by the ensemble began early in the nineteenth century and, from 1821 onward, took place at the Gendarmenmarkt Theater. Sporadic performances continued until 1842, when Kapellmeister Giacomo Meyerbeer instituted a regular subscription series. For decades thereafter the orchestra’s programs remained comparatively restricted and conservative in relation to those of the Berlin Philharmonic Society, founded in 1826 and reorganized as a professional orchestra in 1882. Only after Felix Weingartner assumed leadership of the Königliche Kapelle in 1892 did the ensemble assume a prominent place in Berlin’s concert life. Richard Strauss served as its music director from 1908 to 1920.

During the culturally dynamic 1920s the orchestra aligned itself with contemporary musical developments. Its principal conductors of the era included Furtwängler, Erich Kleiber, Klemperer, Zemlinsky, and Bruno Walter; most departed following the Nazi seizure of power in 1933.

In 1934 the opera orchestra received the title Staatskapelle (State Orchestra). Herbert von Karajan, an Austrian conductor, directed it from 1938 to 1945. A further administrative change in 1944 redesignated the ensemble the Preussiche Staatskapelle (Prussian State Orchestra), which suspended concerts on 19 April 1945 as Allied forces entered the city. Performances resumed on 16 June 1945 under the restored name Staatskapelle Berlin. Extended tenures by music directors Franz Konwitschny and, from 1964 to 1990, Othmar Suitner guided the Staatskapelle Berlin through its period as East Berlin’s foremost orchestra under German Democratic Republic authority.

In 1989 the orchestra’s members petitioned the government for conversion into an autonomous, democratically administered institution—an action that contributed to the broader public pressures culminating months later in the collapse of the communist regime and German reunification. Daniel Barenboim has held the post of general music director of the Staatskapelle Berlin since 1991.