Hanoi Opera House
| The Hanoi Opera House | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| General information | |
| Status | Complete |
| Type | Opera house, theater |
| Architectural style | Neoclassical, eclecticism |
| Location | Trang Tien, Hanoi |
| Country | Vietnam |
| Construction started | 7 June 1901 |
| Opened | 9 December 1911 |
| Cost | ₣2 million, equivalent to ~US$8.4 million in 2011 |
| Height | 34 m (112 ft) |
| Dimensions | |
| Other dimensions | length 87 m (285 ft) width 30 m (98 ft) area 2,600 m2 (0.6 acres) |
| Design and construction | |
| Architect | Broyer, V. Harley, Francois Lagisquet |
| Main contractor | Travery, Savelon |
| Other information | |
| Seating capacity | 598 |
| Website | |
| www |
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The Hanoi Opera House (Vietnamese: Nhà hát lớn Hà Nội, French: Opéra de Hanoï) is an opera house in central Hanoi, Vietnam. It was erected by the French colonial administration between 1901 and 1911.
It was modeled on the Palais Garnier, the older of Paris's two opera houses, and is considered to be one of the architectural landmarks of Hanoi. After the departure of the French the opera house became the scene for several political events. as well as the scene of street fighting during the fight for Hanoi.
The Hanoi Opera House provides the names for the neighboring Hilton Hanoi Opera Hotel which opened in 1999, as well as for the MGallery Hotel de l'Opera Hanoi, which opened in 2011. For historical reasons associated with the Vietnam war, the Hilton Hanoi Opera Hotel was not named the Hanoi Hilton.
The opera house is described in the memoirs of Blanche Arral who performed in the new Hanoi Opera House in 1902 while waiting for the 1902 Exposition of Hanoi to open. The opera had depended on touring artists performing French and Italian repertoire during the colonial period for a mainly French audience.
After the departure of the French the building was used for Vietnamese plays and musicals. The return of Western opera, and the first major non-French or Italian opera, was a performance of Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin organised under Vietnam-Soviet cultural auspices in 1960, where the Russian vocal coach selected an untrained singer Quý Dương as a fit for the baritone title role.
Today the orchestra of the opera overlaps with the Vietnam National Symphony Orchestra, and calls on the Hanoi Philharmonic Orchestra of the Hanoi Conservatory. Famous singers of the company include the Tchaikovsky Conservatory-trained soprano Lê Dung, the youngest ever person to be awarded People's Artist of Vietnam in 1993.
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Wikipedia