Culture Minister Barbara Klepsch (CDU) has praised the Saxon State Orchestra on its 475th anniversary as an outstanding cultural ambassador for the Free State. With its "musical brilliance," the exceptional orchestra makes opera productions and ballet performances at the Semper Opera "unique" and makes a significant contribution to its international reputation, she said in a statement on Thursday. The anniversary will be celebrated in Dresden on Friday with a festive concert on the day of the orchestra's founding, led by principal conductor Christian Thielemann.
Born in 1548 as the court orchestra of then-Elector Moritz of Saxony, today's Staatskapelle is one of the most traditional orchestras in the world and is considered the oldest continuously existing. The list of conductors and composers who worked with it reads like a "Who's Who" of music history and ranges from Schütz, Vivaldi and Bach to Mendelssohn Bartholdy, Schumann, Berlioz, Liszt, Hindemith or Wagner, who gave it the name "Wunderharfe". Richard Strauss had nine operas premiered by the orchestra.
In GDR times, it was the only East German orchestra that also had West German conductors as chiefs, such as the Austrian Otmar Suitner or the American Herbert Blomstedt. Stars such as Herbert von Karajan and Carlos Kleiber also traveled to record with her. In her domicile, the Semperoper, she can be heard in about 260 opera and ballet performances and 50 concerts per season. It also makes regular guest appearances in major music centers around the world and was the resident orchestra of the Salzburg Easter Festival from 2013 to 2022.
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