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The programme begins on Thursday, 16 April 2026 at 3.30 pm in the Tonstudio Hall of the Croatian National Theatre in Zagreb with a workshop for voice professionals, Voice and Speech in Theatre: How to Care for, Prepare and Use Them. The workshop was devised by Ines Carović and Iva Bašić, with the participation of phonetics students.

The workshop is intended for Opera and Drama fellows, as well as all performers and professionals who use their voice and speech professionally or intensively. Participants will have the opportunity to become acquainted with the basics of vocal hygiene, voice warm-up techniques, and the principles of sustainable use of voice and speech in a performance context. Through practical exercises and examples, topics will include recognising vocal strain, preparing the voice for work, and developing healthier and more efficient vocal habits.

The programme continues at 5 pm with an operatic segment which, on the occasion of World Voice Day, features two performances of the opera The Human Voice in the same time slot.

The audience will have the opportunity to experience the same opera in two different ways: the first performance interpreted by Dubravka Šeparović Mušović, and the second by Ivana Lazar. Both performances are included with a single ticket, with no interval between them.

The opera The Human Voice by the French composer Francis Poulenc (1958) is based on the one-act play of the same title by Jean Cocteau (1930), who also directed and designed the set for the opera’s premiere. The plot follows a telephone conversation between a woman (referred to in the opera simply as “She”) and her former lover, who is leaving her for another woman. The Human Voice is staged by the distinguished Croatian dramaturge Sanja Ivić.

World Voice Day highlights the importance of the voice as a fundamental means of expression, communication and artistic practice, as well as its sensitivity and the need for its proper and sustainable use in professional work.