Harry Kupfer was born in Germany. He worked in Stralsund, Chemnitz, Weimar and Dresden. From 1981 on he was director of Komische Oper Berlin and Professor at the Musikhochschule Hanns Eisler Berlin. For his last production as chief director at Komische Oper Berlin, The Turn of the Screw (Britten), he was awarded the Bavarian Theatre Prize in 2002. He is a member of the Akademie der Künste Berlin, of Freie Akademie der Künste Hamburg as well as Sächsischen Akademie der Künste Dresden. He has directed more than 200 productions, including at the Bayreuth Festival:  Der fliegende Holländer, Der Ring des Nibelungen (Wagner), at the Salzburg Festival: Die schwarze Maske (Penderecki) as well as Giovanna d'arco, Macbeth (Verdi) and the world premiere of Bernarda Albas Haus (Reimann) at the Bavarian Staatsoper, The Devils of Loudon (Penderecki) and West Side Story (Bernstein) in Dresden. His most recent productions were Palestrina (Pfitzner), La Damnation de Faust (Berlioz) in Frankfurt, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (Wagner) in Zurich and The Gambler (Prokofiev) at Frankfurt.

Productions of his preformed at the Israeli Opera:
Les Contes d'Hoffmann (2014)