With the latest features of Coppél-I.A last week, the Liceu has closed the 2022/23 season, the second dedicated to celebrating its 175th anniversary. The theater on La Rambla has registered an overall occupancy of 82%, with 273,000 spectators, a 3% increase compared to the 2021/22 season, when there were 265,000.
With a program of 40 shows and more than 200 performances, including operas, dance, concerts, and recitals, about 30 performances have sold out all available tickets. Some of the titles that achieved sold out were La gata perduda, Plensa's Macbeth, 7 Deaths of Maria Callas, or the concert under the baton of Gustavo Dudamel.
One of the most successful proposals has been the four LiceUnder35 performances (Il trovatore, Tosca, Alexina B., Dido & Aeneas), always achieving sold out and attracting 7,500 spectators. In addition, 6,500 tickets with exclusive youth rates for other performances of the season must be added. In this way, a total of 14,000 tickets for young audiences have been sold, repeating last season's figure. All in all, the Liceu maintains its average age, set at 50 years, as in the 2021/22 season, slightly below the three previous seasons, when it was 53 years.
The Liceu has closed the season in economic balance, with a budget of 51 million euros, 9.4% more than the previous year. Administrations have contributed almost 49% of the budget. As for own resources, the remaining 51%, patronage accounted for a total of 7.9 million euros, a record figure that allowed exceeding the 15% budget barrier. On the other hand, subscriptions totaled 15,500, failing to reach the target of 17,500 that the institution had set as an objective for its 175th anniversary.
The Gran Teatre del Liceu is going on vacation with its sights set on next September 27, when a 2023/24 season will kick off with the leitmotif of irreversible cracks, thinking of all the wounds that torment the operatic protagonists who take to its stage fleeing an ineluctable destiny. The first show will be Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's opera Eugene Onegin. We will have to gather strength because the Barcelona theater will receive next season the visit of great conductors such as John Adams, Gustavo Dudamel, and Jordi Savall. It will also be the season that will allow the Barcelona theater to leave behind the debt it has been dragging since 2013, for an amount of 16 million euros, a turning point that will allow a new stage to open.