Theatre and Opera

A slideshow of images from my opera work

As an assistant director I assisted Trevor Nunn at Glyndebourne and Peter Hall at Glyndebourne, The Royal Opera House Covent Garden and The National Theatre. I directed for Mid Wales Opera, The Aldeburgh Festival and the London Symphony Orchestra. I taught at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, The Royal College of Music, Trinity College, The Royal Academy, The Birmingham Conservatoire and the Universities of Birmingham and York. In 1986 I set up the Modern Music Theatre Troupe with Paul Barker, specialising in the performance of new music theatre and producing over 20 world premieres.

I was resident opera director for the London Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican. Productions for the LSO included Britten's A Midsummer Nights Dream conducted by Sir Colin Davis and 'Higglety Pigglety Pop' by Oliver Knussen conducted by the composer. I worked on the world premiere of A Whitehouse Cantata by Leonard Bernstein conducted by Kent Nagano. New work included 'On the Road with Ron and Ros' at the South Bank Centre and a staging of 'Noises, Sounds and Sweet Airs' by Michael Nyman in Italy.

• Director of Opera. The London Symphony Orchestra:
• Artistic Director. The Grand Opera HouseYork.
• Artistic Director: The Modern Music Theatre Troupe.
• Director: Michael Nyman Band: Noises Sounds and Sweet Airs
• Director: Mid Wales Opera: Barber of Seville, Die Fledermaus, Tales of Hoffman, Rigoletto, The Magic Flute.
• Director of many small scale opera and theatre productions

Freelance work included: The Turn of the Screw (Britten) Aldeburgh, The Tempest (Shakespeare) The Green Room Manchester, Carmen (Bizet) Pavilion Opera, Into The Woods (Sondheim), The Bartered Bride (Smetana) The Birmingham Conservatoire, The Tales of Hoffmann (Offenbach), Rigoletto (Verdi) Mid Wales Opera, La Pazzia Senile (Banchieri) MMTT at the Purcell Room, Salome (Strauss) Bournemouth Orchestras Tour, Fantastic Mr Fox (Dahl) Gardner Centre Brighton, Fungus The Bogeyman (Briggs) Belgrade Coventry.

Full listing of opera and theatre credits

Reflections

I have done lots of opera and theatre. I have virtually no record of that part of my life as at the time it didn't seem that important, but here are a few highlights that I can remember.

•  La Pazzia Senile. A Madrigal Opera. I directed it twice once in a minimalist sort of alienating style with lots of grey people and once as a piece of Euro-pop with a desperate Radio 3 style presenter.
•  The Barber of Seville was funny, vulgar and crass with all the furniture on wheels.
•  The Late Shakespeare's with Peter Hall at the National Theatre. The production that changed my view of acting. Peter Hall discovered an algorithm in Shakespeare's verse.
•  The Tales of Hoffman with MWO. A magical production, probably the best set designer I ever worked with, Jeanette Pritchard.
•  The Magic Flute with MWO. A magical production, probably the best costume designer I ever worked with, Rosa Diaz and it starred my wife Maria Bovino.
•  An opera by Smetana called the Devils Wall. Great chorus work by me but some awful conceptual rubbish to accompany it, also by me.
•  All my work with the composer Paul Barker, good and bad, and we did lots of both.
•  A play by Feydeau showed me what a brilliant actor and writer Steven Chance is.