SALZBURG MARIONETTE THEATER
Musical Magic on Strings
The Sound of Music movie is celebrating a 50th Anniversay and Lady Gaga recently made a twitter worthy appearance at the Oscars paying tribute to Julie Andrews. Andrew Lloyd Webber
held a world wide search to find the perfect Maria
for a London production of the Broadway musical “The
Sound of Music”. Perhaps he needed look no further than Salzburg,
the home of the Von Trapp family story, location for the movie version,
and where the perfect Maria Von Trapp can be found at the end of a handful
of strings. The Salzburg Marionette Theater which has been entertaining
children and adults for over 90 years with its particular kind of theatrical
magic has inaugurated a very popular production of the family musical
to accompany its repertoire of Mozart operas and fairy tales.
Salzburg Marionettes
The Salzburg Marionettes
are one of many such companies around the world, but possibly the most
famous. Begun in 1913 by Salzburg professor and
sculptor Anton Aicher, with a debut of Mozart's “Bastien und Bastienne”,
the marrionettes singing opera became a sensation, touring the world
and performing in various temporary quarters around Salzburg. The Salzburg
Marionette Theater settled into its own permanent theater next to the
Landestheater at the edge of the Kurpark and Mirabelle Gardens in the
center of Salzburg in July of 1971 with the first performance in the
new theater of Rossini’s “Barber of Seville”
Marionette Theater
The
scale sets and costumes of the Salzburg Marionettes, designed by internationally
renowned artists fill the black reduced proscenium of
the grand theater stage with color and special effects as the voices
seems to indeed come from the stringed puppets. The operas are performed
in their original languages, in somewhat trimmed form, while screens
in the theater walls provide English translations of the unfolding story.
While awaiting the beginning of a performance in the lobby of the marionette
theater one
can have a close-up view of the diminutive carved characters about 27
inches tall, but once entering the theater and with
the lights dark, through a particular alchemy of the mind and theatrical
magic, you soon begin to accept the string bound performers as having
a decidedly human quality and certain they must be much larger than life.
Kids (or adults) who might fall asleep at a real life opera
will be mesmerized by the miniature version of wood and string. Of all
the touristy things to do in Salzburg these operatic stringed
figures might be one of the most memorable.
The origins of the
Salzburg Marionettes reaches back to the baroque age. Puppet plays
were used in the medieval Christian church to spread
the word. The term "marionette" to describe puppets on strings
seems to have come from the reformation of the early 1600s from an affectionate
nickname for a puppet version of the Virgin Mary. The Austrian version
of the Italian Punchinello, or the English Mr. Punch, commonly known
to slapstick Judy around in a children’s stage version of wife
beating, in Austria was known in various forms as Kaspar or "Kasperl".
The young musical prodigy Amadeus Mozart was one of thousands of children
to enjoy the antics of this character in touring marionette shows by
Salzburg court artist Johann Hilverding, and later inspired to use him
as the character Papageno in his “The Magic Flute”.
Performances
The Salzburg
Marionettes perform a rotating repertiore of operas and children’s
musicals ranging from Mozart’s “Don Giovanni” and “Magic
Flute” to Johann Strauss’ “Die Fleidermaus”,
Prokofiev’s “Peter and the Wolf”, Engelbert Humperdinck’s “Hansel & Gretel”,
and now added Rogers and Hammerstein's “The Sound of Music”.
The company goes on tour through much of the winter months,
but March to October can be found at home at the theater. Tickets to
the Salzburger Marrionetten Theater cost €35 and can
be purchased through various ticket agencies, at the theater box office
at Schwarzstraße 24, or at most hotels in Salzburg through the
concierge.
For
more Salzburg marionette history, the signature Salzburger Castle on
the
hill over-looking
the city has a marionette museum in the bowels
of the fortress with a collection of historical puppets, including a
few locked in dungeons. Fans of the “The
Sound of Music” film with Julie Andrews can visit some of the Salzburg
locations (see Schloss
Hellbrunn Fountains)
for the movie right behind the theater. The Mirabelle Garden with its arched
green arbor were backgrounds for the “Do
Re Mi” song
number in the movie and a “Sound
of Music” sites tour can be taken from the Panorama Sightseeing
Tours ticket office on the opposite side of the gardens at Mirabellplatz
next to the bus station and the St Andra Church. Just look for the
painted cow. © Bargain
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Marionetten Theater
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SEE ALSO:
MOZART
HOUSES IN SALZURG
MOZART DINNER CONCERT
CAFE
TOMASELLI
VIENNA
MOZART ORCHESTRA CONCERTS
