132 Best Performing Arts Venues in Germany

The impressive modern RheinMain CongressCenter was completely rebuilt using a mix of natural stone, wood, glass, and metal, and reopened in 2018. Its events listings include concerts, cultural events, balls, and trade fairs. The Italian restaurant bagutta housed within offers pizza, pasta, antipasti, and sweets, and has a sun terrace out front as well as a glass-fronted upstairs interior, from where you can watch what's going on in the banqueting hall below.

Classical and pop concerts, symposia, film, and international theater are presented at this wood-paneled music hall inside the Museum Kunstpalast.

A Schäfertanz (Shepherds' Dance) was once performed around the Herterichbrunnen, the ornate Renaissance fountain on the central Marktplatz, whenever Rothenburg celebrated a major event. Although its origins go back to local shepherds' annual gatherings, the dance is now celebrated with locals from the area costumed as maids, shepherds, soldiers, and nobility. It takes place in front of the Rathaus several times a year, chiefly at Easter, Pentecost, and in September as part of the Imperial City Festival.

The rebellious actors at the Schaubühne am Lehniner Platz, once the city's most experimental stage, have mellowed somewhat but still put on great performances, frequently with English and French subtitles. Their regular, avant-garde stagings of well-known Shakespeare plays provide a wonderful opportunity to enjoy German theater, even if you don't know a word of German. (You can always brush up on the story beforehand and follow along with your own English text.)

The municipally owned Schauspielhaus has a repertoire that includes works by Sophocles, Goethe, Shakespeare, Brecht, and Beckett, along with more contemporary plays, including by Arthur Miller. All are performed with modern, even avant-garde staging, with English subtitles.

The Schauspielhaus is home to the 20 or so private theater companies in the city. Until its main space on Offenbachplatz reopens in 2024 after a major renovation, productions take place at an industrial space ( Carlswerk, Schanzenstrasse 6–20) in the Mülheim neighborhood. There are occasional productions with English subtitles.

In summer, try to catch a few performances at this annual music festival (July–late August), which features orchestras composed of young musicians from more than 25 countries. Some concerts are held in the Lübecker Dom or the Marienkirche; some are staged in barns in small towns and villages. For exact dates and tickets, contact Schleswig-Holstein Konzertorganisation.

Theatrical and musical performances are held at the Heidelberg castle during this annual festival from late June through July.

Started in 1993, this annual summertime festival features open-air drama or comedy performances, which are held at various venues around Schwerin including the Mecklenburg State Theatre, the castle garden, the National Theatre, and the National Museum.

The quirky Schmidt Theater and Schmidts Tivoli has become Germany's most popular variety theater, presenting a classy repertoire of live music, vaudeville, and cabaret.

Chamber-music concerts are given regularly at the Schumannhaus, where composer Robert Schumann spent his final years.

In August, Konstanz shares this one-day city festival with neighboring Kreuzlingen in Switzerland, with street events, music, clowns, and magicians, and ending with fireworks over the lake.

The opera in Dresden holds an international reputation largely due to its opera house. Destroyed during the war, the building has been meticulously rebuilt and renovated. Tickets are reasonably priced but also hard to come by; they're often included in package tours. Try reserving tickets on the website, or stop by the box office (just left of the main entrance) about a half hour before the performance. If that doesn't work, take one of the opera-house tours, a nice consolation that gets you into the building.

Built to showcase big-budget musicals, including American imports, this entertainment complex contains theaters, hotels, bars, restaurants, a casino, a wellness center wth indoor pool under a light-filled dome, movie theaters, and shops.

Nuremberg holds this annual summer festival from May through July, with more than 200 events. Its international organ festival in June and July is regarded as Europe's finest.

The Philharmonic plays regularly at various concert venues around town.

Hannover's opera company is internationally known, with productions staged in one of Germany's finest 19th-century classical opera houses. Completed in 1852, the neoclassical opera house has two large wings and a covered, colonnaded portico adorned with statues of great composers and poets. The building originally served as the court theater, but now is used almost exclusively for opera and you can only view its interior beauty with tickets to a performance. It was gutted by fire in a 1943 air raid and restored in 1948.

The Staatstheater Mainz comprises two halls, the Grosses (great) Haus and the Kleines (small) Haus; together they offer opera, drama, and ballet from national and international performers. The U17 stage offers performances from Mainz's youth theater group.

The Stadttheater, Germany's oldest active theater, has staged plays since 1609 and has its own repertory company.

The Stage Operettenhaus stages productions of top musicals including the musical adaptation of Rocky, and Love Never Dies, the follow-up to The Phantom of the Opera. Tours of the theater are also available.

The Tanzfabrik is Berlin's best venue to see young dance talent and the latest from Europe's avant-garde. Additionally, contemporary artists come to learn and practice here in dance classes and workshops. The company holds dance festivals at Uferstrasse 8/23 in Wedding on occasion.

In the august setting of the Schauspielhaus (city theater), the Tanzpalast attracts a thirtysomething crowd. This was the place to be seen in GDR Leipzig.

A 30-minute ride outside Düsseldorf by car, train, or S-bahn (from the Hauptbahnhof) will get you to the industrial city of Wuppertal, whose main claim to fame is its transit system of suspended trains that often run directly over the River Wupper, the Schwebebahn. It's also well known for the Tanztheater Wuppertal, the world-famous dance-theater company of the choreographer Pina Bausch (1940–2009).

The white, tentlike Tempodrom, beyond the ruined facade of Anhalter Bahnhof, showcases international music and rock stars.

This is the best-known theater company in town, with a variety of theater (German only), opera, and concert performances in both the historic theater in a modern second stage in an adjoining building.

Baden-Baden has one of Germany's most beautiful performance halls in the Theater Baden-Baden, a late-baroque jewel built in 1860–62 in the style of the Paris Opéra. It opened with the world premiere of Berlioz's opera Beatrice et Benedict. Today the theater presents a regular series of dramas.

Operas are staged regularly at the Theater Bonn, which also hosts musicals and performances by world-renowned dance companies, including ballet.

The late-19th-century Theater des Westens, one of Germany's oldest musical theaters, features international musicals such as Ghost and Dance of the Vampires.

Theater im Hamburger Hafen is home to Der König der Löwen, a German version of the hit musical The Lion King. The theater, which is on the south side of the Elbe, is reached by ferry (included in ticket price) from St. Pauli Landungsbrücken.

Built in 1787, this gorgeous neoclassic theater is still in regular use and has resident drama, ballet, and musical theater ensembles ranging from classic to contemporary.