Volksoper

When it first started out, today's Volksoper Wien was neither a state-run theatre nor an opera house. It opened in 1898 as the 'Kaiser's Jubilee Civic Theatre' and was initially run as a conventional stage for drama. Standard and comic singspiel operas had to wait until 1903 before they were incorporated into the repertoire: and Vienna's Civic Theatre gradually metamorphosed into the present day Volksoper Wien.