If unable to attend a performance during our our January visit to Paris, we would like to see about a tour of the Opera Bastille building. We have been to a number of performances at the Palais Garnier but have never entered the door of the Opera Bastille.

The availability of tours is usually only confirmed at the last minute, I believe, so we are willing to be patient and wait and see if there are any tours offered during our week.

My question is this. How good is this tour? I have found that tours of major concert halls vary enormously. For example, we found the tour of the beatiful Vienna Stadtoper rushed and uninspiring while the tour of the Opera house in Buenos Aires was very comprehensive.

Can anyone comment on the experience of touring the Opera Bastille? That will help us know how eagerly to pursue this opportunity.

I can't help on the quality as I didn't take it, but I haven't read anything to suggest that they were not regular. I saw somewhere that they were at 10 and 1 and 5:30 pm daily, although those were in French. Perhaps foreign language tours are not regular, if that's what you mean, I don't know. They do give a phone number on the website to call, perhaps you saw that. I saw the regular hours elsewhere (Paris Tourist Office), maybe they don't post them as they change them. I guess it depends -- if you just want to see things, being in French shouldn't matter, but wouldn't be optimal, I agree. For a building like that, might as well hear what they have to say.

If I were you, I"d go over there when arriving to see if you can get a ticket, and then you could check out the current posted tour times. In any case, have a good visit, the building is really a very nice place to see a performance (I've only seen ballet there).

This page will give you the phone number to inquire as to the availability of tours.

http://visites.opera-de-paris.com/?t...p;page=visiter

Since tours must avoid rehearsals, they cannot be announced long in advance.

Yes, thank you, I did see that page and I do understand that the availability of the hall depends on the rehearsal schedule.

Either an English or French language tour would be fine.

Musicteacher, have you taken the tour? If so, would you recommend it?

Thank you.

I have only taken a tour of the Garnier, not the Bastille. It will be a different sort of tour. Whereas the Garnier tour was largely concerned with history, the tour of a modern opera house will be more concerned with "how things work."