The State Opera and Ballet Theatre “Astana Opera” was founded in 2013 on the initiative of President of the Republic of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev.
The Theatre is constructed according to the best classical architectural traditions entwined with the Kazakh national motifs. The technical capabilities of the Astana Opera House conform to world standards.
Today, the repertoire of the Astana Opera House includes works by the renowned national composers, spanning the operas Birzhan – Sara by Tulebayev, Abai by Zhubanov and Khamidi and Kyz Zhibek by Brusilovsky, along with the ballet Karagoz to the music of Zhubanova, as well as world opera and ballet classics such as Verdi’s Attila, Aida and La traviata, Puccini’s La bohème, Tosca, Madama Butterfly and Turandot, Bizet’s Carmen, Tchaikovsky’s The Sleeping Beauty, Swan Lake and The Nutcracker, Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet, Khachaturian’s Spartacus, Asafyev’s The Fountain of Bakhchisarai, Minkus’s La Bayadère and Don Quixote, Eifman’s ballet Rodin, Petit’s Notre-Dame de Paris, MacMillan’s Manon, Adam’s Le Corsaire and others. Artists who have staged performances include Franco Zeffirelli, Yury Grigorovich, Boris Eifman, Altynai Asylmuratova, Alan Buribayev, Giancarlo del Monaco, Pier Luigi Pizzi, Lorenzo Amato, Luca Ronconi, Raimondo Rebeck and others; with the participation of the prominent set designer Ezio Frigerio and the costume designer, Academy Award winner Franca Squarciapino, Sofia Tasmagambetova and Pavel Dragunov.
Along with the famed Kazakhstani artists such as Bibigul Tulegenova, Aiman Mussakhajayeva, Zhaniya Aubakirova, Nurzhamal Ussenbayeva, Maira Mukhamedkyzy, Marat Bisengaliev and others, the world-famous stars appeared on the stage of the Astana Opera House, including Plácido Domingo, Zubin Mehta, Elena Obraztsova, Valery Gergiev, José Carreras, Anna Netrebko, Marcelo Álvarez, Svetlana Zakharova, Iana Salenko, Anna Antonicheva, Olga Smirnova, Elisa Carrillo Cabrera, Vadim Repin, Denis Matsuev, Vladimir Spivakov, Ildar Abdrazakov and Giuseppe Acquaviva...
Prominent Kazakhstani companies have performed on tour at the Astana Opera, as well as those of the Teatro di San Carlo di Naples, the Genoese Teatro Carlo Felice, the Mariinsky Theatre, St. Petersburg, the Novosibirsk Opera and Ballet Theatre, the Tbilisi Paliashvili State Opera and Ballet Theatre, St. Petersburg Eifman Ballet, etc. As part of the EXPO-2017, a number of significant events were a great success at the Astana Opera, including the 25th anniversary edition of Plácido Domingo’s Operalia, The World Opera Competition, two performances of La traviata, starring Plácido Domingo as Germont, and the tour of the Milanese Teatro alla Scala, which presented Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Falstaff and Ludwig van Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9. Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 8 and Karl Jenkins’s Solemn Ode Shine Astana, performed under the baton of Principal Conductor of the Astana Opera House Alan Buribayev and featuring more than a thousand choir performers and orchestra musicians from Kazakhstan, Italy and other countries, were also a great success.