He enrolled in three different courses of study as an opera singer, as a director for musical theatre and as a cultural manager.
From 1997 to 2007 he was opera director of the famous Semperoper in Dresden and from 2007 till 2011 he was the General Director of Theater Bremen in Germany. In addition he founded the Dresden Semperoper Ball in 2006.
As chairman he founded the international singing of Italian Opera the competition Competizione dell’Opera in Dresden in 1996, which has become one of the best of its kind till today.
As director he staged Aida, The Flying Dutchman and Turandot at the Seebühne Bremen. from 2008 to 2010. He also produced the gala event for the 50th anniversary of the town twinning between Dresden and St. Petersburg at the Mikhailovsky Theatre in St. Petersburg and also worked at the Mariinsky Theatre for a production in 2010. A year later he directed the opera Tsar and Carpenter (Zar und Zimmermann) at the Boris Pokrovsky Chamber Opera in Moscow. In October 2012 Frey staged Richard Wagner’s opera The Flying Dutchman at the theatres in Ulan-Ude and Irkutsk. In 2013 he produced the opening gala for the new opera house in the Primorsky region at Wladiswostok. In October 2014 he premiered a new production of Mozart’s Cosi fan tutte in Ulan-Ude. He directed the opera Tosca in 2015/16 in Wladiwostok, Beijing and Batumi. Also in 2016, he directed Ariadne of Naxos at the Chamberopera of Boris Pokrowski and in 2017 — Magic Flute at the Bolshoi theatre of Belarus in Minsk.
Since 2014 he has been a regular advisor the general Director at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow.
Hans-Joachim Frey has worked as general and artistic director of LIVA in the European Capital of Culture Linz in Austria since 2012/13. Among other thinks he is responsible for the Brucknerhaus and the International Bruckner Festival.
He has been invited professor at the Seoul Arts College since 2011, since 2015 also at the EWHA University in Seoul/ South Korea.
From 2017/18 Hans-Joachim Frey was becoming the new artistic Director of the Sirius-Foundation Talent and success in Sochi.
Productions:
Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor — Stage Director
«To the 200th anniversary from the birth of Jacques Offenbach»(concert) — Stage Director