In September 2011, conductor Ed Spanjaard was the Artist in Residence (AIR) at de Theaterschool’s Production and Stage Management study programme. Ed Spanjaard works with both modern and classical repertoire and is one of the most prominent conductors in the Netherlands. Over the course of his residency, second-year students learned from him about his work as a conductor. They were invited to take up the challenge of following Spanjaard in his approach to the classical and modern compositions that he conducted in autumn 2012.

Ed Spanjaard was the second AIR at the Production and Stage Management course. He succeeded Paul Koek who held the same position from 2009 to 2011. In appointing Spanjaard, the Production and Stage Management study programme extended its intensive research into the relationship between budding production managers and passionately committed artists, and into the possibility of developing a unique and personal vision and establishing one’s own position as a producer.
Students following the Production and Stage Management study programme train as production managers, stage managers and ‘creative producers’. Their shifting role in culture takes centre stage in the course.

Ed Spanjaard discussed the themes of the compositions with students and teaching staff. These were covered in separate workshops on costumes, stage setting, video and sound. The workshops fed into a collective final presentation and individual installations by the students in December 2011.

About Ed Spanjaard
Ed Spanjaard received his musical education as a pianist and conductor at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London. From 1973, he was a répétiteur and assistant conductor for the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden, the Glyndebourne Festival Opera, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Leonard Bernstein and Herbert von Karajan.

Spanjaard’s official debut with the Concertgebouw Orchestra in 2001 was hugely successful, and he has been invited back regularly ever since. As a pianist he has specialised as an accompanist. He has performed many world premieres of works together with the Nieuw Ensemble, and collaborated with this group on setting up the Atlas Ensemble, whose members include musicians from all over the world. As an opera conductor, Ed Spanjaard has worked with the Netherlands Opera (Amsterdam), Opéra National de Lyon, the Nationale Reisopera (Enschede), Opera Zuid (Maastricht) and Opera in Ahoy (Rotterdam), where he has directed  several major productions. In 2008, Spanjaard started working with the Nationale Reisopera and Orkest van het Oosten on a series of performances of Wagner's Ring Cycle.For more information check his website.

The art of creative passion in 'ON AIR 4'

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