82 Best Performing Arts in Russia

This world-renowned theater continues to produce innovative shows, despite a string of recent scandals—including the resignation of its two ballet stars and an acid attack on its artistic director. The Russian flair for set and costume design alone can often be enough to keep an audience enthralled. Performances on the main stage sell out quickly, so order tickets far in advance. Tickets for the second stage next to the main theater are easier to come by.

Psychological drama reigns here. Most of the ballets in the repertoire of this internationally acclaimed troupe—one of the only professional contemporary ballet company in St. Petersburg—have been inspired by the biographies of extraordinary Russians with a tragic fate or are based on Russian literature. A must-see is Red Giselle, which tells the story of the great Russian ballerina Olga Spessivtseva, who fled Russia after the Bolshevik Revolution and spent 20 years in a psychiatric ward in New York. Also highly recommended are Anna Karenina, Tchaikovsky, and The Russian Hamlet, devoted to the doomed life of Russian tsar Paul I, who was murdered in Mikhailovsky Castle. The troupe, founded in the late 1970s, has no permanent home, and spends most of its time abroad. When here, the company usually performs at the Alexandrinsky Theater, the Mariinsky, or the Mikhailovsky Theater.

Buoyed with funding from oligarchs like Chelsea Football Club owner Roman Abramovich, the center has become one of Moscow's hottest venues for international and Russian contemporary art. There's a good café here, too.

Opened in 1923 as a theater for railroad workers, this revamped, stunningly creative space is the hub of Moscow's contemporary theater scene. The schedule includes plays directed by top Russian directors as well as dance, film, and music.

With a smattering of performances with English, French, and Italian subtitles, the MDT is home to one of the best theater companies in Russia and is well worth seeing. The repertoire includes productions of Chekhov, Dostoyevsky, Shakespeare, and Oscar Wilde. The theater is also one of the few companies in town to continue to stage the finest plays from the Soviet era. Seeing their whole repertoire has been compared to living through the entire 20th-century history of Russia. If you have a whole day to spare and lots of stamina, the nine-hour performance of Dostoyevsky's The Possessed makes for an incredible theatrical experience, although it can be a bit hard on the posterior and comes without translation. It takes two consecutive evenings to sit through the company's veteran show, Fyodor Abramov's Brothers and Sisters, but it's an great experience. Order tickets well in advance, because it's rare that the Maly plays to a less-than-packed house.

The names Petipa, Pavlova, Nijinsky, and Nureyev—and countless others associated with the theater and the birth of ballet in St. Petersburg—are enough to lure ballet lovers here from around the globe. The Mariinsky is without a doubt one of the best ballet companies in the world, with a seemingly inexhaustible supply of stars.

The Imperial Ballet School was founded here on May 4, 1738, by the order of Empress Anna Ioannovna, to be run by Frenchman Jean-Baptiste Lande. French and Italian masters taught the first class of 12 boys and 12 girls. Works of another Frenchman, Marius Petipa, who arrived at the academy in 1847, still dominate the repertoire of the Mariinsky. Today the school is called the Vaganova Ballet Academy in honor of Agrippina Vaganova, who radically changed the way ballet was taught in Russia. The best students traditionally appear on the venerable Mariinsky stage around Christmas in The Nutcracker and then in May and June in graduation performances.

Between February and March, the company runs the impressive Mariinsky International Ballet Festival, which has at least one premiere and an array of guest performers from other renowned companies, such as London's Royal Ballet, Opera Bastille, and the American Ballet Theater.

The Mariinsky is also at the forefront of the world's opera companies, thanks largely to the achievements of the Mariinsky's artistic director, Valery Gergiev. The company's best operatic repertoire centers on Russian opera: Tchaikovsky's The Queen of Spades, Prokofiev's Semyon Kotko, Shostakovich's The Nose, Rimsky-Korsakov's The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh, and The Snow Maiden are particularly recommended.

Operas are all sung in their original language; Russian operas are all provided with English subtitles, while Russian subtitles are given for foreign operas. Verdi can be hit-or-miss, but Wagner is one of Gergiev's greatest passions, and the company now feels very much at home with the composer. The orchestra's rapport with the conductor is amazing, and the sound is nuanced and powerful.

Ballet and opera share the calendar throughout the year; the opera and ballet companies both tour, but at any given time one of the companies is performing in St. Petersburg.

Rachmaninoff, Scriabin, and Tchaikovsky are among the famous composers who have worked here. The acoustics of the magnificent Great Hall are superb, and portraits of the world's great composers hang above the high balcony. The adjacent Small Hall is usually reserved for chamber-music concerts.

An artsy crowd frequents this simple movie theater with top-quality projection and sound. The films are always shown in their original language, usually with Russian subtitles.

One of St. Petersburg's best-kept secrets is its oldest concert hall, dating to the 1780s and presenting choral events as well as symphonic, instrumental, and vocal concerts. Many famous musicians, including Glinka and Rimsky-Korsakov, have performed in this elegant space along the Moika, near the Alexander Pushkin Apartment Museum and the Winter Palace. The main entrance and the surrounding courtyards have been beautifully restored.

Russia's oldest theater opened in 1756 and is one of the country's most elegant and comfortable. Its repertoire is dominated by 19th-century classics but with prominent Moscow director Valery Fokin at the helm, the company is enjoying a prolonged renaissance and staging new productions that have been critically acclaimed. Fokin's interpretations of Dostoyevsky's The Double and Gogol's The Government Inspector are thought-provoking and engaging. The theater also hosts an international drama festival in the early summer.

Housed in the brightly painted brick buildings of a Soviet silk spinning mill, this vast design center has everything from photography and modern art exhibitions to architecture bureaus, design showrooms, and a roof-top ice rink in winter.

An umbrella venue for a dozen experimental companies of various genres holds performances in its large hall and a variety of basements, attics, and backrooms. Once a full-fledged theater, it has turned into a modern art complex, where aspiring directors experiment with material by playwrights like Luigi Pirandello, Ivan Turgenev, and the Presnyakov Brothers. Each October the theater hosts an impressive four-week Baltic Theater Festival, attracting the best talent from the Baltic Sea region.

The former home of Prince Beloselsky-Belozersky, a rose-color neobaroque palace, has a large mirrored ballroom that hosts concerts.

Known as BDT, this theater is one of the jewels in St. Petersburg's crown and with a repertoire that focuses on classics—from Chekhov and Ostrosky to Shakespeare and Albee—attracts Russia's top acting talent to its boards. With the appointment of one of Russia's most respected directors for the stage, Andrei Moguchi, as artistic director, big things are expected.

One of the oldest continuously operating children's theaters in Russia began at the start of the 20th century. The theater has delighted generations of Soviet and Russian children with its charming renditions of classics like The Ugly Duckling and The Nutcracker.

Many different galleries are housed within this vast exhibition center and if you wander long enough you're likely to find something to fit your taste, from traditional landscapes to the latest avant-garde outrage. In front, a huge art market snakes its way along the river. Among the piles of kitsch and banal landscapes you can find some real gems. Be prepared to bargain.

The theater is a bit out of the way but the symphony orchestra and puppet theater stage musicals and operas that both kids and adults can enjoy.

Cultural Heritage Preservation Board. If you buy any artwork in St. Petersburg, ask the shop to provide you with the necessary documentation to let you take it out of the country. If you're in any doubt, take the item to the Board for the Preservation of Cultural Valuables for assessment and to receive the relevant certificate. Prices depend on the item and how quickly you need the paperwork to be processed (usually three days) but are generally less than 1000R. 17 ul. Malaya Morskaya, City Center, St. Petersburg, St.-Petersburg, 190000. 812/571–0302. Metro: Admiralteyskay.

A mixture of classic Russian art and crowd-pulling exhibitions by celebrity artists can be found at this established space.

A hotel movie house caters to the expatriate community with recent original-language Hollywood releases.

International soloists and ensembles gather for the festival, usually held late September through early October.

With 2,000 works by nearly 150 Russian artists on display, this mammoth five-floor complex is the country's largest contemporary art exhibition space. Conceived by Marina Varvarina, the widow of a powerful local businessman, Erarta is packed with art works dating from the 1940s to the present day. The gallery has a team of enthusiastic curators who busily tour the country for up-and-coming talent. The place always has the name of an exciting new artist up its sleeve. In addition to the halls, where regular exhibitions are held, there is a gallery where artworks are sold.

This was one of the first private galleries in post-Soviet Russia. Today it displays contemporary art from the best of the previous generation's nonconformists to current names.

On display here are changing exhibitions of work by contemporary artists, including paintings, graphics, and decorative art. There is also a shop that sells artists prints and books, as well as unusual souvenirs.

For chamber and vocal music, head to this small theater, part of the Shostakovich Philharmonic (it's just around the corner from the main hall of the Philharmonic). It's also known as the Maly Zal (Small Hall).

One of Moscow's first galleries, this is also one of its most controversial, due to the attention-loving nature of owner Marat Guelman. There's a definite shock value to many of the modern and avant-garde exhibits. It's a good bet for performance art.

In addition to delivering consistently appealing and critically acclaimed opera performances, the Helikon troupe is equally talented in space management: even the grandest of classics are fitted with ease onto the small stage.

This glorious and highly unusual theater in the Hermitage mainly hosts the St. Petersburg Camerata, a fine but often overlooked chamber ensemble. The theater doesn't have a box office, so purchase tickets at a theater kiosk or via your concierge. The entrance is reached via the museum's staff entrance at 34 Dvortsovaya embankment.

Lovers of contemporary classical music flock here to hear pieces written by its members—look for names such as Sergei Slonimsky, Boris Tishchenko, and Andrey Petrov—and their students at the conservatory.

Chamber music concerts are held here in atmospheric salons.