Promised End

Although just thirty, Ryan Wigglesworth has rapidly established himself as one of the foremost composer-conductors of his generation. New compositions of his are much anticipated, his performances as conductor and soloist are highly praised, and he now claims a well-deserved place in the ranks that represent today’s remarkable young British composers, both in the UK and internationally.

In 2010/11 season Ryan Wigglesworth will make his debut with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra not only as director and soloist but with a programme also including a world premiere of his latest orchestral work A First Book of Inventions. He also conducts the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, the Hallé Orchestra in a recording project of works of Harrison Birtwistle, and for English Touring Opera he will conduct the world premiere of Alexander Gohr’s opera Promised End. Ryan returns to the 2010 BBC Proms conducting the Britten Sinfonia, collaborating with them later in the season in a programme with Barbara Hannigan. He also returns to the Philharmonia’s “Music of Today” series. Ryan begins a collaboration with the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra as Composer in Residence initially writing a work for piano, violin and chamber orchestra to be directed by Wigglesworth from the keyboard.

Ryan Wigglesworth has conducted over forty premieres, introducing works by composers such as Elliott Carter, Oliver Knussen, and Harrison Birtwistle, whose latest opera The Corridor, featuring Mark Padmore he premiered with the London Sinfonietta at the 2009 Aldeburgh and Bregenz festivals and on Southbank Centre. Last season he also collaborated with Hans Werner Henze in the Barbican’s weekend festival celebrating his works, in a notable performance of Henze’s Voices with London’s Guildhall School of Music and Drama.

Ryan Wigglesworth’s close association with the BBC Symphony Orchestra also involves him in his work as a composer. Following last year’s premiere of his own work Sternenfall, two further new works quickly followed: The Genesis of Secrecy, which was first performed at the 2009 BBC Proms conducted by Sir Andrew Davis, and Augenlieder, a song cycle written for and premiered by Claire Booth, which Wigglesworth conducted himself at the Barbican in November 2009. Other recent highlights include the premiere tour of his Tenebrae, commissioned by the Britten Sinfonia and performed at venues including Krakow’s Philharmonic Hall and the Wigmore Hall and song cycles for the tenor James Gilchrist and Claire Booth (both also receiving their premieres at the Wigmore Hall).

Born in Yorkshire, Ryan Wigglesworth was educated at Oxford University and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. Between 2007-2009 he was a University Lecturer at Cambridge University and a Fellow of Corpus Christi College.

James is General Director of ETO and has written original libretti for two operas and translations for three others, as well as several works of fiction.

Operatic work includes Katya Kabanova, Rusalka, Susannah, Eugene Onegin, Orfeo, Jenufa, Anna Bolena, Maria Stuarda, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, as well as Teseo and Alcina (ETO); Ariodante, Erismena, Flavio, The Cunning Little Vixen (ETO and OTC); The Marriage of Figaro (RCM and ETO); Tolomeo (London Handel Festival/ ETO); Tamerlano, Amadigi, Rodelinda, L’elisir d’amore, Katya Kabanova and The Rake’s Progress (OTC); Cinderella (De Vlaamse Opera/ Transparant); Don Giovanni (Canadian Opera Company); La Voix humaine (Teatro Nacional São João, Oporto); staging of Kurt Weill songs (Culturgest, Lisbon); La Spinalba (Casa da Musica, Porto), The Cunning Little Vixen (Moravian National Theatre, Brno).

Adam received his BA with Honours in Theatre Design at the RWCMD. He was a group winner of the Linbury Biennial Prize for Stage Design in 2003. Recent operatic engagements include costume design for Roméo et Juliette (ON) and both costume and set design for Le nozze di Figaro (RNCM) and As I Crossed the Bridge of Dreams (Almeida Opera). Ballet engagements include Children of Adam and Sensorium (Royal Ballet at the ROH). Additionally, Adam worked with ETO as designer for Country Matters and Katya Kabanova.

Opera includes: The Magic Flute, Katya Kabanova, Don Giovanni, Anna Bolena, Susannah, The Seraglio, Eugene Onegin (English Touring Opera); The Cunning Little Vixen, (National Theatre Brno); The Ring Cycle, The Magic Flute, The Marriage of Figaro, Tosca, Hansel and Gretel (Longborough Festival Opera); Names of the Dead (Battersea Arts Centre).

Theatre includes: Peter Pan, Be Near Me (NTS); Serenading Louie (Donmar Warehouse); Waste (Almeida); Othello (West End); Elektra (Young Vic); A Christmas Carol, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (Birmingham Rep); As You Like It, Bollywood Jane, Macbeth , How Many Miles to Basra?, West Yorkshire Playhouse); Kes, Season’s Greetings, (Liverpool Playhouse); Amadeus, The Little Fir Tree, Fen, Far Away, Macbeth (Sheffield Theatres); Of Mice and Men (Mercury Theatre, Colchester); A Streetcar Named Desire (Clwyd Theatr Cymru); Zero Degrees and Drifting…, Could It Be Magic? (Unlimited Theatre).

Dance includes: Bruise Blood, Flicker (Shobana Jeyasingh Dance Company); The Land of Yes, The land of No, Square Map of Q4 (Bonachela Dance Company); And Who Shall Come to the Ball? (Candoco); About Around, This Moment is Your Life, The Diminishing Present (bgroup); Odyssey (Krische /Wright); Havana Rakatan (Sadler’s Wells); Mischief (Theatre Rites); No More Ghosts, (Richard Alston Dance Company); Love & War, Sea of Bones, Bad History, Green Apples, Dive (Mark Bruce Company); Frontline, Green in Blue, Little Red, Expression Lines, White Space, Second Signal, Shot Flow (Henri Oguike Dance Company).

Musicals include: The Witches of Eastwick, All the Fun of the Fair, Aspects of Love (UK tours); Assassins (Sheffield Theatres);My Fair Lady (Singapore); City of Angels
(Frankfurt).

Nigel Robson was born in Argyleshire and studied with Alexander Young and Gustave Sacher. He is well established as one of Britain’s most versatile lyric tenors with an operatic and concert repertoire ranging from Monteverdi to the most contemporary of compositions, and is particularly well known for his interpretations of Britten.

Operatic engagements have included Bajazet/Tamerlano in Drottningholm; the title role in Peter Grimes for the Nationale Reisopera in Holland; Captain Vere/Billy Budd for the Canadian Opera Company; The Witch/Hansel and Gretel; Laca/Jenufa and Captain Vere/Billy Budd for Welsh National Opera; the title role in Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria in Lisbon and for Opera North; the title role in Idomeneo at the Bayerische Staatsoper in Munich; Male Chorus/The Rape of Lucretia at the Grand Théâtre de Tours; Pandarus/Troilus and Cressida for Opera North; The Madwoman/Curlew River for Opera Factory; Septimus/Theodora for Glyndebourne; Golo in Schumann’s Genoveva for Garsington Opera; Maderna’s Venetian Journal and Satyricon for the Opera de Nancy in France and the Flanders Opera in Belgium, and Death in Venice at the Teatro Colon in Buenos Aires. His involvement in the work of living composers includes the Dutch world premiere and the UK premiere of Guo Wenjing’s Wolf Cub Village (Holland Festival and the Almeida Opera Festival) and Alexander Goehr’s Kantan and Damask Drum for Almeida Opera. Recent works which were written for him include Make Ishi’s Tojiraretta Fune, which was staged in Holland, Germany and Japan, and John Lunn’s The Maids in London, with his brother the countertenor Christopher Robson, directed and produced by his wife, Olivia Füchs.

Concert appearances have included Maderna’s Venetian Journal with Peter Eotvos in Amsterdam; Bach’s St John Passion with the Orchestre National de Lille; Judas Maccabeus in Berlin; Jephtha with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment; Britten’s Spring Symphony with the Rotterdam Philharmonic; Stravinsky’s Renard in Paris with Sir Simon Rattle; Britten Serenade with the Philharmonia, Bournemouth Sinfonietta and Britten Sinfonia; Das Lied von der Erde with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales; Britten’s War Requiem in St Petersburg, Prague, Tel Aviv and Madrid; Elgar’s Dream of Gerontius in Bratislava and Aarhus; Die Schöne Mullerin in recital in Sheffield, and concerts with the Nieuw Ensemble in Amsterdam, Paris, Lisbon, Milan and at the Edinburgh and Huddersfield International Festivals.

Nigel Robson’s most recent appearances include Renard with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra under Sakari Oramo; Gluck’s La Clemenza di Tito for the Classical Opera Company at St John’s Smith Square, London; Maderna’s Satyricon in Rome and L’Aquila; Britten’s Serenade with Michael Zilm and the Orquestra Metropolitana de Lisboa; Younghi Pagh-Paan’s Mondschatten for Stuttgart Opera; Opera North’s Peter Grimes; The Witch/Hansel & Gretel for the Nationale Reisopera; Aschenbach/Death in Venice for Frankfurt Opera, and Iro/Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria for Nederlandse Opera.

He has also recently premiered a project entitled ‘The Tenor Man’s Story’, which is very close to his own life and opened the 2005 Enschede Festival in Holland. At its centre is a poem written by his father about returning to

Campbeltown, Scotland to see the grave of his sister Christine who died there, aged two. The form of the work is a multimedia recital with integrated audio and visual projections using the works of Britten, Dufay, Cage and the Beatles, as well as piano improvisations by Howard Moody and audio compositions of his own.

Nigel Robson’s recordings include Handel’s Tamerlano, Jephtha and Alexander’s Feast (Gardiner/Phillips Classics); Monteverdi’s Orfeo, Poppea and Vespers 1610 (Gardiner/Deutsche Grammophon Archiv); Tippett’s Songs for Dov (Tippett, Scottish Chamber Orchestra/Virgin Classics); Stravinsky’s Renard (Rattle/Sony Classics); Mozart’s Idomeneo/Arbace (Gardiner/Deutsche Grammophon Archiv); Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia/Male Chorus (Hickox/Chandos Records); Walton’s Troilus and Cressida/Pandarus (Hickox/Chandos Records); Delius’ Mass of Life (Hickox/Chandos Records), ); Janacek Jenufa/Laca (Sir Charles Mackerras/Chandos), and a dramatic TV film of Britten’s Abraham and Isaac for Dutch TV directed by Pierre Audi.

In 2010 Nigel Robson enjoyed a huge success in Idomeneo for La Monnaie and also performed in a staging of Bernstein’s Mass in Munich. During the summer of 2010 he will be performing the role of Il tempo for Opera Les Azuriales, Cap Ferrat, France in a production of Handel’s Il triumfo del tempo e del disinganno. In the 2010/11 season, Nigel Robson will be performing Sacerdote in Idomeneo for the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées.

Lina Markeby studied at GSMD. She has performed Idamante/ Idomeneo (Chelsea Opera Group); Idamante/ Idomeneo and Sesto/ La clemenza di Tito (Mozart galas with John Eliot Gardiner/ English Baroque Soloists); Third Sprite/ Rusalka and Carmen/ La Tragédie de Carmen (Wexford Festival); Messagiera/ Ninfa/ L’Orfeo (Drottningholms Slottsteater). Lina’s work with William Christie includes the roles of Doris/ Zaide/ L’Europe galante (Ambronay Baroque Academy), a solo in his recent tour of Idomeneo and Second Woman/ Dido and Aeneas (Wiener Festwochen 2006, Opera Comique 2008, Wiener Festwochen 2009, De Nederlandse Opera 2009). Future plans include Dorabella/ Cosi fan tutte and Cherubino/ Le nozze di Figaro (L’Atelier Lyrique de Tourcoing/ Jean-Claude Malgoire in Tourcoing and Paris 2010).

Born
Göteborg, Sweden

Training
RAM; Opera Studio 67 (Stockholm)

Awards
Opera Rara Patric Schmidt Bel Canto Prize 2007

Opera
Donna Elvira Don Giovanni (Amersham Music Festival); Iolanta Iolanta (RAM); Iphise Dardanus (RAM); Violetta La Traviata (Clonter Opera); Musetta Cover La Boheme (SO)

Concerts
Haydn Stabat Mater (London Mozart Players); ROH Lunchtime Concert (ROH); Glastonbury Abbey Concert (Royal Philharmonic Society)