Seventeenth-century France offered Perrin essentially two types of organization for realizing his vision: a royal academy or a public theater. He believed that the prevailing opinion of the time that the French language was fundamentally unmusical was completely incorrect. The poet Pierre Perrin began thinking and writing about the possibility of French opera in 1655, more than a decade before the official founding of the Paris Opera as an institution. See also: French opera The Opera under Louis XIV Pierre Perrin The company's training bodies are also active, with 7 concerts from the Atelier Lyrique and 4 programmes from the École de Danse. In the 2012–2013 season, the Paris Opera presented 18 opera titles (two in a double bill), 13 ballets, 5 symphonic concerts and two vocal recitals, plus 15 other programmes. Įach year, the Paris Opera presents about 380 performances of opera, ballet and other concerts, to a total audience of about 800,000 people (of whom 17% come from abroad), with an average seat occupancy rate of 94%. With this money, the company runs the two houses and supports a large permanent staff, which includes the orchestra of 170, a chorus of 110 and the corps de ballet of 150. The company's annual budget is in the order of 200 million euros, of which €100M come from the French state and €70M from box office receipts. Small scale and contemporary works are also staged in the 500-seat Amphitheatre under the Opéra Bastille.

Currently called the Opéra national de Paris, it mainly produces operas at its modern 2,723-seat theatre Opéra Bastille which opened in 1989, and ballets and some classical operas at the older 1,979-seat Palais Garnier which opened in 1875. Classical ballet as it is known today arose within the Paris Opera as the Paris Opera Ballet and has remained an integral and important part of the company. It was founded in 1669 by Louis XIV as the Académie d'Opéra, and shortly thereafter was placed under the leadership of Jean-Baptiste Lully and officially renamed the Académie Royale de Musique, but continued to be known more simply as the Opéra. The Paris Opera ( French: Opéra de Paris, IPA: ( listen)) is the primary opera and ballet company of France.

Modern opera glasses