S. I. Zimin Opera Theater

(also Zimin Opera), a private Moscow opera company, which was formed in 1904 upon the merger of S. I. Zimin’s opera company, founded at the beginning of 1904, and most of the singers of the Society for Private Opera. From 1908 productions were staged at the Solodovnikov Theater (now the Operetta Theater). In 1917 the opera theater became a state theater and existed under various names until 1924.

Continuing the traditions of the Moscow Private Russian Opera, the S. I. Zimin Opera Theater promoted Russian classical opera; it staged Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov without the usual cuts and with the scene “In the Forest of Kromy.” Also in the tradition of the Moscow Private Russian Opera, the theater staged important Western European classics; the first performance in Russia of Wagner’s Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg was staged at the theater in 1909. Operas by Soviet composers were performed in 1923 and 1924. Famous conductors, stage directors, and artists worked at the theater, and prominent opera singers performed there.