61 Best Performing Arts Venues in Austria

The original congress house was built by Archduke Leopold V in 1629 as the first freestanding opera house north of the Alps, and in the 19th century it was converted into the Dogana, or customs house. Destroyed during World War II, its remains were used to create this modern congress and events center in 1973. Concerts take place in the modern Saal Tirol.

The Konzerthaus, home to three performance halls. The Grosser Konzerthaussaal, Mozartsaal, and Schubertsaal are all esteemed venues for a range of musical genres, including classical, cabaret, pop, and jazz. The lineup has included greats like Mnozil Brass, Dianne Reeves, Goran Bregović, and the Herbert Pixner Projekt.

Opposite Vienna's House of Music, Lucas Feichtner's two-story gallery is abundant with natural light, which helps showcase the array of bold works ranging from photography to collage. National and international artists, such as Petar Mirkovic and Stylianio Schico, are represented here.

Historical recordings of Mozart's Magic Flute and other favorites are on the program at this magnificent puppet theater in Schönbrunn Palace. These outstanding performances fill a whole evening, with programs designed for adults as well as for children.

A 19th-century opera house, the Opernhaus Graz, with its resplendent Rococo interior, is a showcase for young talent and experimental productions as well as more conventional works; it stages three to five performances a week during its late September to June season. Tickets are generally available until shortly before the performances; prices start at €11.50. Call for information or stop by the office.

Since 1946, this agency has been selling tickets for the Salzburg Festival and other events in and around Austria.

Originally built as a theater for the people, the Raimund staged popular folk plays in its early days. It then moved on to opera for a spell before becoming a leading venue for long-running musicals. Here, lovers of the genre can enjoy such hits as Hair and Mamma Mia!

Extensively restored in recent years, the Ronacher presents the latest musical smash hits from Broadway in a magnificent, traditional space with ornate details, a painted ceiling and a two-ton chandelier.

Eyes from all corners of the world are on this city during the Salzburger Festspiele, which mounts a full calendar of magnificently produced operas every summer, and even more during the Easter (April) and Whitsun (May) festivals. These performances are held in the Grosses Festspielhaus (Great Festival Hall), the Haus für Mozart (House for Mozart), the Landestheater, the Felsenreitschule, the Mozarteum, and numerous other smaller venues, where lieder recitals and chamber works predominate.

The biggest event on the Salzburg social calendar—as it has been since it was first organized by composer Richard Strauss, producer Max Reinhardt, and playwright Hugo von Hofmannsthal in 1920—is the world-famous Salzburg Festival, usually held late July through late August. The most star-studded events feature top opera stars and conductors and are very expensive, with keen audience members pulling out all the stops—think summer furs, Dior dresses, and white ties. However, other performances can be more relaxed and more reasonably priced, and events outside the main festival halls, the Grosses Festspielhaus (Great Festival Hall) and the Haus für Mozart (House for Mozart), located on the grand promenade of Hofstallgasse, are even cheaper. This street is especially dazzling at night, thanks to the floodlighted Fortress Hohensalzburg. There are also concerts and operas at other theaters in the city, including the the Summer Riding School (Felsenreitschule), Kollegienkirche, and the Mozarteum.

Order your tickets early, as major performances sell out several months in advance.

The concerts performed by the Salzburg Mozart Ensemble and the Mozart Chamber Orchestra are presented in the grand Golden Hall at Festung Hohensalzburg and often include works by Mozart. A special candlelight-dinner-and-concert ticket is offered.

World-class guest orchestras and Salzburg's own Mozarteum Orchestra appear in the Grosses Festspielhaus and the Great Hall of the Mozarteum during the fall and winter under the auspices of the Salzburg Cultural Association. If you visit over Sylvester (New Year's Eve), you can experience the Austrian tradition of the brass-and-wind-powered New Year's Concert. It also created Salzburg Cultural Days, filling the autumn off-season with top talent and exciting performances.

This neo-Baroque gem has nearly 1,000 seats and presents roughly 25 productions a year, including opera, theater, and ballet. Mozart is always in the repertoire, and it is continuing to expand into daring new works. The Mozarteum Orchester Salzburg is its regular orchestra, and the theater has its own opera, theater, and dance ensembles. You can purchase tickets from the theater's box office. For those unable to catch a show or who want to see behind the scenes, guided tours (€5) take place every second Saturday at 2 pm.

For nearly 80 years, the theater has been associated with the University of Music and Performing Arts. Here visitors can watch student performances of both opera and dramatic arts.

This five-day festival during mid-June, the largest of its kind in the country, serves as a showcase for the Austrian and European electronic music and art scene. Concerts take place across Graz in venues ranging from clubs and beaches to empty plots of land. Tickets can be purchased online in advance or during festival week at the various spots where performances take place.

A large variety of operas, operettas, plays, and ballets are performed year-round at the Stadttheater in Klagenfurt, an inviting Art Nouveau building designed by the famous theater architects Helmer and Fellner of Vienna and completed in 1910. The box office is open Monday through Saturday 9–6.

The annual Steirischer Herbst, or Styrian Autumn Festival, a celebration of the avant-garde with the occasional shocking piece in experimental theater, music, opera, dance, jazz, film, video, and other performing arts, is held in Graz from the end of September to the middle of October.

The Styriarte festival (late June to mid-July) gathers outstanding classical musicians from around the world. Performances take place throughout the city including the Helmut-List-Halle and Schloss Eggenberg. The ticket office is located in the center of the city.

Austria's foremost center for contemporary dance performances is Tanzquartier Wien. The season runs from September to June, and is followed by the so-called Factory Season, when the center concentrates solely on the projects presented in its dance studios.

The world's premiere dance companies have been visiting Innsbruck between the last week in June and mid-July for this international dance festival since 1992. The world-renowned Dance Theatre of Harlem and the Sao Paulo Dance Company, as well as Maracana, Brazil's Grupo Corpo, and Sankai Juku, all feature regularly. Visitors can join in dance workshops, too. Tickets are available through the tourist office or the festival office.

Constructed in 1838 as a grain storehouse, back when Bregenz was still an important commercial hub, this listed building was converted into a 700-seat theater in 1954. Today, it is part of the Vorarlberg Landestheater, showing a roster of contemporary and classic plays, along with many family-friendly productions and live music concerts.

This beautiful Rococo-style historic theater located in Mariahilf is more than 200 years old. It was used and abused for decades as a contemporary musical venue, but now the building—which is closely linked to Beethoven, who lived here—has renewed its role as an opera house, attracting an international crowd. It's open year-round, and hosts a premiere nearly every month. The selection of works performed here is tremendous, including Janáček, Prokofiev, Britten, Handel, Monteverdi, Rossini, and Bach.

The Theater in der Josefstadt, the oldest theater still in operation, stages classical and modern works year-round in a space once run by the great producer and teacher Max Reinhardt. The theater had, of late, been seeming to gather layers of dust, but happily director Herbert Föttinger has restored its reputation for more avant-garde and daring productions.

Innsbruck's principal theater is said to be the world's oldest German-speaking theater. It was built in 1654 as the court opera house, but totally renovated in the classical style in 1846 and modernized and extended in the 1960s. Both operas and operettas are presented in the main hall, usually starting at 7:30 pm; plays and dance in the Kammerspiele start at 8 pm. Obtain tickets at the box office or at the city's main tourist office.

One of the world's great opera houses, the Staatsoper has been the scene of countless musical triumphs and a center of unending controversy over how it should be run and by whom. A performance takes place virtually every night from September to June, drawing on the vast repertoire of the house, with an emphasis on Mozart, Verdi, and Wagner. Guided tours are given year-round.

For English-language theater—mainly classic comedies and dramas—head for this cozy and charming venue. The season runs early September to early July.

Opera, operetta, and ballet are performed at the Volksoper, just on the outer edge of the Innere Stadt at Währinger Strasse and Währinger Gürtel. Prices here are significantly lower than at the Staatsoper, and performances can be every bit as rewarding. This theater has a packed calendar, with offerings ranging from the grandest opera, such as Mozart's Don Giovanni, to an array of Viennese operettas, including Johann Strauss's Die Fledermaus, to Broadway musicals. Most operas and musicals are sung in German. The opera house is at the third stop on streetcar Nos. 41, 42, or 43, which run from Schottentor, U2, on the Ring.

This artsy theater features more alternative film options, with most movies shown in their original language with German subtitles. There are also special children's performances on the weekends. The cinema also has a lovely cafe offering wine, beer and light snacks.

Although the well-known mid-May to mid-June Vienna Festival, the Wiener Festwochen, signals the end of the primary season, the rest of the summer music scene, from mid-July to mid-August, nowadays brims with activities, particularly in the Theater an der Wien.