List of opera directors
Encyclopedia
This 'List of opera directors' is an inclusive register of famous stage producers and directors who have worked, or are working, in the opera
world.
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
world.
- Christopher AldenChristopher Alden (director)Christopher Alden is a radical theater director known for staging revisionist productions of opera. He is the twin brother of David Alden, also an opera director, and belongs to a generation of modernist directors that includes Robert Wilson and Peter Sellars, though Alden retains his own personal...
(1949– ) - David AldenDavid Alden (director)David Alden is a prolific theater and film director known for his post-modernist settings of opera. He is the twin brother of Christopher Alden, also an opera director in the revisionist mold...
(1949– ) - Neil ArmfieldNeil ArmfieldNeil Geoffrey Armfield AO is an Australian director of theatre, film and opera.Born in Sydney, Armfield was the youngest of three boys. The son of a factory worker at the nearby Arnott's biscuit factory he was brought up in the suburb of Concord adjacent to Exile Bay...
(1950s– ) - Stephen Barlow (director)Stephen Barlow (director)Stephen Barlow is an Australian born , London based opera director. He was educated at Melbourne Grammar School and the University of Melbourne...
(1969– ) - Ruth BerghausRuth BerghausRuth Berghaus was a German choreographer and opera and theatre director.Berghaus was born in Dresden and studied Expressionist dance and Dance direction with Gret Palucca there and was an advanced student at the German Academy of Arts in Berlin, at least part of the time under Walter Felsenstein -...
(1927–1996) - Calixto BieitoCalixto BieitoCalixto Bieito is a Spanish theater director known for his "radical" interpretations of classic operas.-Biography:...
(1963– ) - Luc BondyLuc Bondy- Biography :Trained in Paris with the theatre teacher Jacques Lecoq, he received a job in 1969 as an assistant at the Hamburg Thalia Theatre. In a surprise, he took over in 1985 after the resignation of Peter Stein at the Schaubühne in Berlin. He also worked as a producer of both plays and operas...
(1948– ) - Nicholas Broadhurst (1954– )
- Christopher Caleffi (1949- }
- Tito CapobiancoTito CapobiancoTito Capobianco is a noted stage director of opera.He made his official debut with Aïda, at the Teatro Argentino, La Plata, in 1953, then worked at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires...
(1931– ) - Albert CarréAlbert CarréAlbert Carré was a French theatre director, opera director, actor and librettist. He was the nephew of librettist Michel Carré and cousin of cinema director Michel Antoine Carré...
(1852–1938) - Patrice ChéreauPatrice ChéreauPatrice Chéreau is a French opera and theatre director, filmmaker, actor, and producer.-Biography:Patrice Chéreau was born in Lézigné, Maine-et-Loire, and went to school in Paris. At a young age he became well-known to Parisian critics as director, actor, and stage manager of his high-school theatre...
(1944– ) - Martha ClarkeMartha ClarkeMartha Clarke is an American theater director and choreographer noted for her multidisciplinary approach to theatre, dance, and opera productions. She is the creator of plotless, dreamlike works that are perhaps described by the term "moving paintings. Her work frequently emphasizes striking...
(1944– ) - John CopleyJohn CopleyJohn Michael Harold Copley is a British theatre and opera producer.He was born in Birmingham, West Midlands, son of Ernest Harold Copley and Lilian Forbes, and attended King Edward VI Five Ways. After a brief career as an actor, he became stage manager at Sadler's Wells in 1953 and resident...
(1933– ) - Frank CorsaroFrank CorsaroFrank Corsaro is one of America's foremost stage directors of opera and theatre. His Broadway productions include The Night of the Iguana ....
(1924– ) - John Cox (1935– )
- Paul CurranPaul Curran (director)Paul Curran is a Scottish opera director. He was General Manager of the opera company of the Norwegian National Opera and Ballet , and artistic consultant to Central City Opera of Denver, Colorado.-Early life:...
(1964– ) - Willy DeckerWilly Decker (director)Willy Decker is a German theatre director, particularly known for his opera productions. He staged the world premieres of Hans Werner Henze's Pollicino , Antonio Bibalo's Macbeth , and Aribert Reimann's Das Schloss .Decker was born in Pulheim near Cologne and was educated first at the Rheinischen...
(1950- ) - John DexterJohn DexterJohn Dexter was an English theatre, opera, and film director.- Theatre :Born in Derby, England, Dexter left school at the age of fourteen to serve in the British army during World War II. Following the war, he began working as a stage actor before turning to producing and directing shows for...
(1925–1990) - August EverdingAugust EverdingAugust Everding was a German opera director and administrator. He studied at the Universities of Bonn and Munich, where launching his career in the 1950s...
(1928–1999) - Brigitte FassbaenderBrigitte FassbaenderBrigitte Fassbaender , is a mezzo-soprano opera singer, a stage director and since 1997 Intendant of the Tiroler Landestheater in Innsbruck, Austria...
(1939– ) - Walter FelsensteinWalter FelsensteinWalter Felsenstein was an Austrian theater and opera director.He was one of the most important exponents of textual accuracy, productions in which dramatic and musical values were exquisitely researched and balanced...
(1901–1975) - Jürgen FlimmJürgen FlimmJürgen Flimm is a German theater and opera director, and theater manager. After establishing himself as one of the exponents of Regietheater, Flimm was called to manage renowned theaters and festivals...
(1941– ) - Götz FriedrichGötz FriedrichGötz Friedrich was a German opera and theatre director.He was a student and assistant of Walter Felsenstein at the Komische Oper Berlin in Berlin, where he went on to direct his early productions...
(1930–2000) - Colin GrahamColin GrahamColin Graham, OBE was a British-born stage director of opera, theater, and television.Graham was educated at Northaw School , Stowe School and RADA...
(1931–2007)
- Peter Hall (1930– )
- Nicholas HeathNicholas Heath (director)Nicholas Heath is a British opera director.Heath was born in London. His father, cellist Kenneth Heath, helped found the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields chamber orchestra....
(1959– ) - Werner HerzogWerner HerzogWerner Herzog Stipetić , known as Werner Herzog, is a German film director, producer, screenwriter, actor, and opera director.He is often considered as one of the greatest figures of the New German Cinema, along with Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Margarethe von Trotta, Volker Schlöndorff, Werner...
(1942– ) - Kasper Bech HoltenKasper Bech HoltenKasper Holten is a Danish stage director and Artistic Director of the Royal Danish Opera. He was appointed in 2000, at age 27, succeeding Elaine Padmore, and six years later was still the youngest person running a European opera house.In March 2011 it was announced that, at the end of the...
(1973– ) - Andreas Homoki (1960- )
- Richard JonesRichard Jones (director)Richard Jones is a British theatre and opera director.- Early life :Jones was born in London, and studied at the University of Hull and London...
(1953– ) - Guy Joosten (1963– )
- Václav KašlíkVáclav KašlíkVáclav Kašlík was a Czech composer, opera director and conductor, known for his operas, both on the stage and on television....
(1917-1989) - Jonathan KentJonathan Kent (director)Jonathan Kent is an English theatre director and opera director. He is best known as a director/producer partner of Ian McDiarmid at the Almeida Theatre from 1990 to 2002.-Early life:...
(1951– ) - Peter KonwitschnyPeter KonwitschnyPeter Konwitschny is a German opera and theatre director.-Biography:Peter Konwitschny grew up in Leipzig, where his father Franz Konwitschny was principal conductor of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra...
(1945– ) - Barrie KoskyBarrie KoskyBarrie KoskyBarrie Kosky's name is sometimes misspelled as Barry Kosky, Barrie Koski, Barrie Koskie. is an Australian theatre and opera director.Kosky also plays the piano, as he did in his production of Monteverdi's Poppea...
(1967– ) - Harry KupferHarry KupferHarry Kupfer is a German opera director. He studied theatre in Leipzig and directed his first opera, Antonín Dvořák's Rusalka, in 1958....
(1935– ) - John La BouchardièreJohn La BouchardièreJohn La Bouchardière BMus MA is a British opera, film and television director.He was a chorister at Magdalen College, Oxford, studied at the University of Birmingham and was a staff director at English National Opera...
(1969– ) - Mark LamosMark LamosMark Lamos is an American theatre and opera director, producer and actor. Under his direction, Hartford Stage won the 1989 Tony Award for Outstanding Regional Theatre and he has been nominated for two other Tonys...
(1946– ) - Phyllida LloydPhyllida LloydPhyllida Lloyd CBE is an English director, best known for her work in theatre and as the director of the most financially successful British film ever released, Mamma Mia!.-Career:...
(1957– ) - Thomas de Mallet Burgess (1964– )
- Lotfi MansouriLotfi MansouriLotfollah “Lotfi” Mansouri is an Iranian-born opera director and manager. He was an opera director from about 1960 onwards, and is most well known for being the General Director of the Canadian Opera Company and of the San Francisco Opera from 1988 through 2001...
(1929– ) - David McVicarDavid McVicarDavid McVicar is a Scottish opera and theatre director. He attended Netherlee Primary School and then Williamwood High School. He studied as an actor at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama, graduating in 1989...
(1966– ) - Dejan MiladinovicDejan MiladinovicDejan Miladinović von Voynits is a Serbian opera director. He was born in Belgrade, former Yugoslavia, in a family of opera artists...
(1948– ) - Jonathan MillerJonathan MillerSir Jonathan Wolfe Miller CBE is a British theatre and opera director, author, physician, television presenter, humorist and sculptor. Trained as a physician in the late 1950s, he first came to prominence in the 1960s with his role in the comedy revue Beyond the Fringe with fellow writers and...
(1934– ) - Alexis MinotisAlexis MinotisAlexis Minotakis, known as Alexis Minotis , was born 8 August 1898 or 1899 in Deliana , Chania, Crete and died on 11 November 1990 in Athens, Greece....
(1899–1990) - Mark MorrisMark MorrisMark William Morris is an American dancer, choreographer and director whose work is acclaimed for its craftsmanship, ingenuity, humor, and at times eclectic musical accompaniments...
(1956– ) - Hans NeuenfelsHans NeuenfelsHans Neuenfels is a German writer, poet, film producer, librettist, theatre director and opera director.- Biography :...
(1941–) - Dominik Neuner (1948-)
- Moffatt OxenbouldMoffatt OxenbouldMoffatt Benjamin Oxenbould AM is an Australian opera director.He was Artistic Director of Opera Australia from 1984 until his retirement in 1999. He had been part of the company since he graduated from the National Institute of Dramatic Art in 1962...
(1943– ) - Richard PearlmanRichard PearlmanRichard Pearlman was an American theatre and opera director and educator known for his encyclopedic knowledge on every aspect of opera from stage direction to makeup....
(1938–2006 ) - Laurent PellyLaurent PellyLaurent Pelly is a French opera and theatre director. At the age of 18, he founded the Compagnie Théâtrale du Pélican which, since 1982, has been co-directed by Agathe Mélinand...
(1962– ) - Pier Luigi PizziPier Luigi PizziPier Luigi Pizzi is an Italian opera director, set designer, and costume designer.-Biography:Pizzi was born in Milan, Italy, and earned a degree in architecture at the Politecnico of Milan...
(1930– )
- David PountneyDavid PountneyDavid Pountney is a British theatre and opera director and librettist internationally known for his productions of rarely performed operas and new productions of classic works...
(1947– ) - Boris PokrovskyBoris PokrovskyBoris Alexandrovich Pokrovsky was the operatic stage director of the Bolshoi Theatre between 1943 and 1982...
(1912-2009) - Jean-Pierre PonnelleJean-Pierre PonnelleJean-Pierre Ponnelle was a noted French opera director.-Biography:Ponnelle was born in Paris. He studied philosophy, art, and history there and, in 1952, began his career in Germany as a theatre designer for Hans Werner Henze's opera Boulevard Solitude...
(1932–1988) - Max Reinhardt (1873–1943)
- Günther RennertGünther RennertGünther Rennert was a German opera director and administrator.Rennert was born in Essen, Rhine Province. Starting as a film director in 1933, he then became involved in the operatic theatre, becoming an assistant to Walter Felsenstein at the Oper Frankfurt...
(1911–1978) - Luca RonconiLuca RonconiLuca Ronconi is an Italian actor, theater director, and opera director.- Biography :After growing up in Tunisia, where his mother was a school teacher, he graduated from the Academy of Dramatic Art in Rome in 1953. He acted in productions of Luigi Squarzina, Orazio Costa, Michelangelo Antonioni...
(1933– ) - Vladimir RosingVladimir RosingVladimir Sergeyevich Rosing , aka Val Rosing, was a Russian-born operatic tenor and stage director who spent most of his professional career in England and the United States...
(1890-1963) - Peter SellarsPeter SellarsPeter Sellars is an American theatre director, noted for his unique contemporary stagings of classical and contemporary operas and plays...
(1957– ) - Otto SchenkOtto SchenkOtto Schenk is an Austrian actor, and theater and opera director.-Life and career:Schenk was born to Catholic parents. His father, a lawyer, had Jewish roots and therefore lost his job after the Anschluss in 1938...
(1930– ) - Daniel SlaterDaniel Slater- Biography :Slater was born in London and educated at Bristol University and Cambridge University.- External links :* * *...
(1966– ) - Jimmy Smith (1973– )
- (Detlef Soelter (director) (1962-)
- Giorgio StrehlerGiorgio StrehlerGiorgio Strehler was an Italian opera and theatre director.-Biography:Strehler was born in Barcola, Trieste to an Austrian father and a Franco-Slovene mother; he grew up speaking Italian but spoke French well and his German was passable. He became suddenly fatherless at the age of three, his...
(1921–1997) - Andrei TarkovskyAndrei TarkovskyAndrei Arsenyevich Tarkovsky was a Soviet and Russian filmmaker, writer, film editor, film theorist, theatre and opera director, widely regarded as one of the finest filmmakers of the 20th century....
(1932–1986) - Luchino ViscontiLuchino ViscontiLuchino Visconti di Modrone, Count of Lonate Pozzolo was an Italian theatre, opera and cinema director, as well as a screenwriter. He is best known for his films The Leopard and Death in Venice .-Life:...
(1906–1976) - Graham VickGraham VickGraham Vick CBE is an English opera director. He studied at the Royal Northern College of Music, Manchester....
(1953– ) - Richard WagnerRichard WagnerWilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
(1813–1883) - Wieland WagnerWieland WagnerWieland Wagner was a German opera director.- Life :Wieland was the elder of two sons of Siegfried and Winifred Wagner and grandson of composer Richard Wagner....
(1917–1966) - Wolfgang WagnerWolfgang WagnerWolfgang Wagner was a German opera director. He is best known as the director of the Bayreuth Festival, a position he initially assumed alongside his brother Wieland in 1951 until the latter's death in 1966...
(1919–2010 ) - Lothar Wallerstein (1882–1949)
- Margarete WallmannMargarete WallmannMargarete Wallmann or Wallman was a ballerina, choreographer, stage designer, and opera director....
(1904–1992) - Deborah WarnerDeborah WarnerDeborah Warner CBE is a British director of theatre and opera known for her interpretations of the works of Shakespeare, Bertolt Brecht, Georg Büchner, and Henrik Ibsen, and for her long-term working relationship with the Irish actress Fiona Shaw.-Early years:Warner was born in Oxfordshire,...
(1959– ) - Marek Weiss (1949–)
- Herbert WernickeHerbert WernickeHerbert Wernicke was a German opera director and a set and costume designer. He was born in Auggen, Baden-Württemberg. He studied piano, flute, and directing at the conservatory in Braunschweig and set design at the academy in Munich...
(1946–2002) - Robert WilsonRobert Wilson (director)Robert Wilson is an American avant-garde stage director and playwright who has been called "[America]'s — or even the world's — foremost vanguard 'theater artist'". Over the course of his wide-ranging career, he has also worked as a choreographer, performer, painter, sculptor, video...
(1941– ) - Francesca ZambelloFrancesca ZambelloFrancesca Zambello is a leading American opera and theatre director. Zambello lived in Europe when she was a child, learning to speak French, Italian, German and Russian. Zambello is of Italian descent, the daughter of Jean , an actress and Charles C. Zambello, a former actor who became head of...
(1956– ) - Franco ZeffirelliFranco ZeffirelliFranco Zeffirelli KBE is an Italian director and producer of films and television. He is also a director and designer of operas and a former senator for the Italian center-right Forza Italia party....
(1923– ) - Mihai TimoftiMihai TimoftiMihai Timofti - Master of Arts is a director, actor, and musician from Chisinau.In 1965 he started his activity in the popular theatre "Contemporanul" , where he appeared for the first time on the stage performing the leading part in the comedy of Mr G.Timofte "The Dreams and Troubles".In 1967, he...
(1948– )
Sources
- The New Grove Dictionary of OperaNew Grove Dictionary of OperaThe New Grove Dictionary of Opera is an encyclopedia of opera, considered to be one of the best general reference sources on the subject. It is the largest work on opera in English, and in its printed form, amounts to 5,448 pages in four volumes....
, edited by Stanley Sadie (1992) ISBN 0-333-73432-7 and ISBN 1-56159-228-5 - The Oxford Dictionary of Opera, by John Warrack and Ewan West (1992) ISBN 0-19-869164-5