Paul McCreesh

Last updated

Paul McCreesh (born 24 May 1960) [1] is an English conductor.

Contents

Paul McCreesh is the founder and artistic director of the Gabrieli Consort & Players. With them he has performed in major concert halls and festivals across the world. He has been the artistic director of the Wratislavia Cantans Festival in Wrocław, Poland and of the Brinkburn Festival in England.

In 2005 Loughborough University conferred on him the honorary degree of Doctor of Letters.

Musical education

McCreesh began his career as a cellist and took his MusB from the University of Manchester in 1981.

Repertoire and performance

Paul McCreesh made his name in the music of the Renaissance and Baroque periods, particularly that of Venice. The Gabrieli Consort was founded in 1982 and as of 2020 is still active. McCreesh and the Gabrielis made a successful Proms début in 1992: the second part of the concert was "Music for the Coronation of a Doge, 27 April 1595". [2]

In recent years he has also worked with modern instrument orchestras including the DSO Berlin, RSO Berlin, Zurich Chamber Orchestra, Ensemble Orchestral de Paris, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, Gothenburg Symphony, Sinfónica de Euskadi, Stockholm Philharmonic and Beethovenhalle Bonn, the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra and the Orchestra Sinfonica dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia di Roma.

Opera

McCreesh has conducted Handel's Jephtha for Welsh National Opera and Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice , as well as Mozart's The Magic Flute for Royal Danish Opera and, for Komische Oper Berlin, a new David Alden staging of Handel's Alcina . He has also conducted Handel's Rodelinda at the Beaune Festival and at the Brinkburn Festival, which he founded.

Recordings

From 1993 Paul McCreesh built a large discography for Deutsche Grammophon. In 2011 he established Winged Lion, an independent label, which is a subsidiary of Signum Records.

Reconstructions

McCreesh is noted for his "liturgical reconstructions" in which music is presented in the context of a specific liturgy with appropriate background sounds such as bell-ringing. [3] The Gramophone Award winning album "Venetian Coronation" (released on Virgin Classics in 1990) represented a breakthrough for the Gabrieli Consort and Players. A new version of this musical reconstruction of the coronation of Marino Grimani was released in 2012 on Winged Lion. [4] [5]

"Music for the Duke of Lerma" is a musical reconstruction featuring Spanish sacred music associated with Francisco Gómez de Sandoval, 1st Duke of Lerma. It was released on DG's Archiv label. [6]

Opera

In 2020 McCreesh's recording of Purcell's semi-opera King Arthur was judged best recording of the year by BBC Music Magazine . [7]

Related Research Articles

Bartolomeo Barbarino was an Italian composer and singer of the early Baroque era. He was a virtuoso falsettist, and one of the most enthusiastic composers of the new style of monody.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Douai Abbey</span> Church in Berkshire, United Kingdom

Douai Abbey is a Benedictine Abbey at Upper Woolhampton, near Thatcham, in the English county of Berkshire, situated within the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portsmouth. Monks from the monastery of St. Edmund's, in Douai, France, came to Woolhampton in 1903 when the community left France as a result of anti-clerical legislation. The abbey church is listed Grade II* on the National Heritage List for England.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul Agnew</span> Scottish operatic tenor and conductor

Paul Agnew is a Scottish operatic tenor and conductor.

Robin Blaze is a British countertenor.

Susan Gritton is an English operatic soprano. She was the 1994 winner of the Kathleen Ferrier Award and has sung leading roles in a wide-ranging repertoire from Handel and Mozart to Britten, Janáček and Strauss.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sarah Connolly</span> English mezzo-soprano

Dame Sarah Patricia Connolly is an English mezzo-soprano. Although best known for her baroque and classical roles, Connolly has a wide-ranging repertoire which has included works by Wagner as well as various 20th-century composers. She was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2010 New Year Honours and a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in the 2017 Birthday Honours for services to music.

Elin Manahan Thomas is a Welsh soprano. A specialist in Baroque music, she sang at the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle in May 2018.

Charles Daniels is an English tenor, particularly noted for his performances of baroque music. He is a frequent soloist with The King's Consort, and has made over 25 recordings with the ensemble on the Hyperion label.

The King's Consort is a British period music orchestra founded in 1980 by the English conductor and harpsichordist Robert King. The ensemble has an associated choral group, Choir of The King's Consort. Together, they have made over 90 recordings, largely on the Hyperion label, and sold over 1,000,000 discs. The orchestra performs concert seasons in the UK and tours internationally.

Gillian Keith is a Canadian/British operatic soprano, originally from Toronto, Canada, and living in London, UK.

Sarah Fox is an English operatic soprano who has performed at several of the world's leading opera houses, notably the Royal Opera House Covent Garden.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter Bassano</span> English conductor

Peter Bassano is an English conductor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Camilla Tilling</span> Swedish soprano in opera and concert (born 1971)

Camilla Viktoria Rydh, best known as Camilla Tilling, is a Swedish soprano in opera and concert.

Iestyn Davies is a British classical countertenor.

Roderick Gregory Coleman Williams OBE is a British baritone and composer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tim Mead</span> English opera singer

Tim Mead is an English countertenor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ben Parry (musician)</span> British musician, composer, conductor, singer, arranger and producer

Ben Parry is a British musician, composer, conductor, singer, arranger and producer. He is the director of London Voices and was formerly artistic director of the National Youth Choir.

Dunedin Consort is a baroque music ensemble based in Edinburgh, Scotland.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ashley Riches</span> British operatic baritone

Ashley Riches is a British operatic baritone.

Lucy Mary Elizabeth Crowe is an English soprano in opera and concert. She has performed at international opera houses and music festivals such as the Glyndebourne Festival and Rheingau Musik Festival.

References

  1. ↑ "Birthdays today". The Telegraph. 24 May 2013. Archived from the original on 24 May 2013. Retrieved 24 May 2014. Mr Paul McCreesh, founder, director and conductor, Gabrieli Consort and Players, 53
  2. ↑ "30 July 1992. Royal Albert Hall". Proms performance archive. Retrieved 12 July 2019.
  3. ↑ Picard, Anna (23 September 2012). "Album: Gabrieli Consort & Players, A New Venetian Coronation 1595 (Winged Lion)" . Independent.co.uk. Archived from the original on 25 May 2022. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  4. ↑ Rogers, Graham (2012). "Venetian Coronation". BBC. Retrieved 15 June 2012.
  5. ↑ Gill, Andy (June 2012). "Album: Paul McCreesh, Gabrieli Consort & Players A New Venetian Coronation 1595 (Signum)" . Independent.co.uk. Archived from the original on 25 May 2022. Retrieved 7 June 2012.
  6. ↑ Clements, Andrew (22 November 2002). "Music for the Duke of Lerma" . Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  7. ↑ "The winners of the BBC Music Magazine Awards". BBC Music Magazine. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.