PRESS RELEASE
THE GENESIS PRIZES FOR OPERA

Advisory Panel

Giorgio Battistelli, Composer

Born in Rome, Giorgio Battistelli studied piano, composition, analysis and history of music at the conservatory "A. Casella" in Aquila. In 1974 he co-founded the Edgar Varèse Musical Experimentation and Research Group and the Beat 72 instrumental group in Rome.

At the invitation of DAAD in Berlin, he became Composer in Residence from 1985-86. Awards for his compositions include winning the Premio SIAE in the music theatre section for Keplers Traum, and Nuova Musica's Premio Cervo.
1993 saw the beginning of his systematic research and experimentations on "sound in the room" in collaboration with the centre of Sonologia of the University of Padova as well as in the studio of Tempo Reale in Florence, founded by Luciano Berio.

He is one of Europe's most performed living music theatre composers. His first theatrical work Experimentum Mundi (1981), written for 22 artisans from his home town near Rome has been performed all over Europe, America, the Far East, Australia and New Zealand. His many other operas include Aphrodite, Keplers Traum, Teorema (Maggio Musicale Fiorentina, Munich Biennale, Queen Elizabeth Hall), Prova D'Orchestra (Strasbourg), and The Cenci (Almeida and Berlin).

Giorgio Battistelli was artistic director of the Cantiere Internazionale d'Arte Festival in Montepulciano from 1993-96. He is currently artistic director of the Orchestra della Toscana in Florence, and of the Società dei concerti Barattelli in Aquila. His music is published by RICORDI, Milan.

Genista McIntosh, Executive Director, Royal National Theatre

Genista McIntosh is the Executive Director of the Royal National Theatre. Prior to her appointment in 1990 (apart from two years 1984-86 spent representing writers, directors and designers as a Director of the theatrical agency, Marmont Management Limited), she worked at the RSC, which she joined in 1972 as Casting Director. She went on to hold a number of posts; Planning Controller, Senior Administrator and Associate Producer. In January 1997 she became Chief Executive of the Royal Opera House. In May 1997 she resigned and the following October returned to the Royal National Theatre.

She is a Trustee of NESTA (National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts), the Roundhouse Trust, and has recently joined the Board of Welsh National Opera. She is a fellow of the RSA and in 1998 was awarded an honorary doctorate from York University. In 1999 she was created a Life Peer taking the title of Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall.

Michael Morris, Director, Cultural Industry & Co-director, Artangel

Following his tenure as Director of Performing Arts at ICA London in the 1980's, Michael Morris established Cultural Industry in 1988 as an independent, international production company, presenting and producing new work across a complete spectrum of the performing arts. Long term relationships have been forged with Robert Lepage, Pina Bausch, La La La Human Steps, Brian Eno, Robert Wilson, and Laurie Anderson, amongst others, in on-going partnerships with leading venues and festivals throughout Britain and beyond. Cultural Industry also initiates and produces projects that tour outside the UK, notably Shockheaded Peter currently making its way across the globe and soon to be a feature film.

Alongside James Lingwood, Michael Morris is also co-director of Artangel which commissions and produces site-based work by exceptional artists for particular places - both natural and architectural - throughout the UK in the visual, performing and media arts. Since 1992, Artangel's landmark commissions have included Rachel Whiteread's House, Michael Clark's Mmm, William Forsythe's Tight Roaring Circle, Matthew Barney's Cremaster 4, Gavin Bryars' and Juan Munoz' A Man in a Room Gambling and John Berger and Simon McBurney's The Vertical Line to name but a few. "Artangel Afterlives" gives a more enduring form to some of these temporary works through a programme of publications adapting individual projects into videos, books or CDs.

David Parry - Conductor

David Parry studied at Cambridge University and the Royal Academy of Music, London. He went on to study conducting with Sergiu Celibidache before beginning his career as a repetiteur at Glyndebourne Festival Opera. He made his operatic debut with La Cenerentola for the English Music Theatre. He was on the conducting staff of the Dortmund City Opera, and then joined the newly-founded Opera North as a resident conductor. In 1983 he was appointed Music Director of Opera 80, a post he held until 1987, when he left to develop a freelance career.

He has appeared as guest conductor for leading British companies such as Glyndebourne Festival Opera (Così fan tutte and Jonathan Dove's Flight), English National Opera (Le Comte d'Ory, Così fan tutte, The Rape of Lucretia, Ernani and Il Turco in Italia). For Opera North he conducts L'Elisir d'Amore in 2000/01. Foreign opera productions include the Spanish premiere of Peter Grimes, The Rake's Progress and Jenufa (Teatro Lirico Nacional La Zarzuela Madrid), La Fille du Regiment, La Traviata and Il Barbiere di Siviglia at the Orviedo Festival and Carmen in San Sebastian. He conducted Tosca, Die Zauberflöte and Fidelio at the Hong Kong International Festival, Maria Stuarda and La Finta Gardiniera for Theatre Basel, and Lucia di Lammermoor for New Israeli Opera. His numerous opera recordings for Opera Rara and the series of classic repertoire in English for Chandos Records have been hailed by the critics.

In 1992 he became Music Director of Almeida Opera, for whom he has given the world premieres of Nigel Osborne's Terrible Mouth, Kevin Volans' The Man who Strides the Wind, Elena Firsova's The Nightingale and the Rose, Giorgio Battistelli's The Cenci and Ion by Param Vir. Other premieres he has given include Stephen Oliver's Mario and the Magician at the Batignano Festival (Italy) and the UK premiere of Bruno Maderna's Satiricon with Opera Factory.

David Parry regularly conducts leading orchestras in the UK and in Europe including the London Philharmonic, Academy of St Martin in the Fields, Philharmonia, Netherlands Radio and Madrid symphony orchestras. Future plans include the ongoing series of recordings both for Opera Rara and Chandos, productions for English National Opera, Staatsoper Hannover and concerts with the London Philharmonic Orchestra.

David Pountney, Director

Born in Oxford, David Pountney studied at Radley College and Cambridge University. He gained recognition through his production of Káta Kabanova at the Wexford Festival (1972). He was Director of Productions at Scottish Opera from 1975-80, where he directed a Janácek cycle in collaboration with Welsh National Opera. As Director of Productions at ENO from 1983-93 his many productions included Busoni's Doktor Faust, Rusalka, Hansel and Gretel, The Fairy Queen and The Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk.

World premiere productions include Glass's Satyagraha (Rotterdam) and The Voyage (Metropolitan Opera, New York) along with other new works by Maxwell Davies, Holloway, Harvey, Blake, and Osborne. He works regularly at the Vienna State Opera (Rienzi, William Tell and a forthcoming Jenufa), Munich, (Káta, Gounod's Faust) Zürich, (La Fanciulla del West, Boris Godunov, Simplicissimus and later this season Macbeth) and the Bregenz Festival, for whom he directed The Golden Cockerel this summer. He directed the world premiere of Mr. Emmet Takes a Walk at this year's Orkney Festival, a new music theatre piece by Sir Peter Maxwell Davies for which he also wrote the libretto. His recent productions of Martinu's Julietta for Opera North and The Greek Passion for Bregenz/ROH were honoured with a Martinu medal in Prague. Future plans include La Clemenza di Tito in Strasbourg, Shostakovitch's Moscow Cheryomushki for Opera North and Turandot in Salzburg. He is a C.B.E., and a Chévalier des Arts et Lettres.

Jonathan Reekie, Chief Executive of Aldeburgh Productions

Jonathan Reekie began his career working for Musica Nel Chiostro, Batignano, of which he is still a board director. He was then Company Co-ordinator at Glyndebourne where his interest in new opera began.

Following his move to be General Manager of the Almeida Theatre he founded Almeida Opera in 1992, an annual season of contemporary opera. As Director of Almeida Opera he has been responsible for producing nearly thirty new operas.

In 1998 he was appointed Chief Executive of Aldeburgh Productions, responsible for a series of music festivals including the Aldeburgh Festival, the Britten-Pears School for Advanced Musical Studies and the management of Snape Maltings Concert Hall. He also remained Director of Almeida Opera, which regularly collaborates with the Aldeburgh Festival.

Vikram Seth, Writer

The writer Vikram Seth was educated in India, the UK and the USA. He originally trained as an economist, reading PPE at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, completing further studies at Stanford University, California, and at Nanjing University, China. He subsequently held the post of Senior Editor at Stanford University Press (1985-86).

His first publication was the book of poems, Mappings (1982), and since then he has published three further collections of poems as well as a translation of sections from Three Chinese Poets and a novel in verse, The Golden Gate. In 1994 he collaborated with the composer Alec Roth, writing the libretto for the opera Arion and the Dolphin. His two novels in prose, A Suitable Boy (1992), and An Equal Music (1999), were published to popular and critical acclaim. He was made an honorary Fellow of Corpus Christi College in 1994. Her Majesty the Queen has just awarded him an honorary CBE for services to literature.

John Studzinski

Boston-born John Studzinski graduated from Bowdoin College with two BA degrees, in biology and sociology, and gained his MBA from the University of Chicago. He is currently Deputy Chairman of Morgan Stanley International Limited where he has served for over 20 years.

He is a trustee of the Tate Gallery, a life trustee of the Sir John Soane Museum, a member of the finance committee of The Passage, and is on the advisory board of the London Symphony Orchestra. John Studzinski is also a trustee of the international human rights organisation Human Rights Watch and is Chairman of its European effort.

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