Paul McCreesh is fast becoming one of the UK’s most exciting and innovative conductors, equally at home in early and standard repertoire, on the concert platform and in the opera house. CONTACT MANAGER Leyla Gunes Manager Susannah York Skinner Assistant Voted one of the top 100 Conductors of the 20th Century by Classic Music Magazine, McCreesh is the founder and Artistic Director of the period instrument Gabrieli Consort & Players, with whom he has established an outstanding international reputation for his historically-informed presentations of Renaissance and Baroque music. Having enjoyed an exclusive recording contract with DG Archiv Produktion since 1993, his numerous recordings with the Gabrieli Consort & Players have included music by Bach, Gabrieli, Monteverdi, Purcell, Schütz and an on-going series of Handel oratorios which have won international prizes, including Gramophone Awards, ABC Record of the Year, Edisons, Diapason d’Or de L’Année and the Deutsche Schallplattenpreis. RELATED LINKS www.gabrieli.com Newsletter/Spring 2001: Orchestral Touring Highlights Newsletter/Autumn 2000: Paul McCreesh makes sparkling Welsh National Opera debut with Gluck's Orphée Newsletter/Autumn 2000: Record Shelf Newsletter/Autumn 1999: A new McMaestro joins the fold Newsletter/Autumn 1999: Record Shelf His 1997 recording of Handel's Messiah garnered superlative reviews world-wide, confirming McCreesh's status as a major new interpreter of large-scale works. This was followed in 1998 by Solomon, with an international cast of soloists led by Andreas Scholl, and in 2000, by Theodora, all heralded as the finest available recordings of these works. Possessing extremely broad musical interests, McCreesh has over recent seasons conducted a wide range of later repertoire with modern orchestras, in the UK, Europe and the USA including works by twentieth century composers as well as the classical repertoire. Paul McCreesh is also the founder and Artistic Director of Brinkburn Music, a unique festival established in 1994 at a 12th Century Priory in Northumberland. Brinkburn serves as a showcase for the work of Gabrieli Consort & Players and many guest ensembles as part of a rich education programme featuring young musicians of all ages. In the 2000/1 season McCreesh made a phenomenal operatic debut at Welsh National Opera with a universally praised new production of Gluck's Orphée & Eurydice. This was followed by a new production of Britten's Albert Herring at Amsterdam and The Hague Conservatoires and debuts with both the National Symphony in Washington DC and the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra. Other recent highlights have included a tour with the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie, and concerts with Teatro Comunale di Bologna, Vancouver Symphony, Orquesta y Coro de la Comunidad de Madrid, Minnesota Orchestra, Norwegian Opera Orchestra and Copenhagen Philharmonic. Highlights of the 2002/3 season include a performance of the rarely heard Abraham et Isaac by Myslivecek with l’Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France in Paris, concerts with WDR Cologne, Deutsche Sinfonie Orchester Berlin, Australian Youth Orchestra, Israel Camerata, and Orquesta Ciudad de Granada. In the opera house future plans include new productions at Welsh National Opera (Jephtha), Komische Oper Berlin (Orlando), Académie Baroque, Ambronay (Athalia) and a debut at Royal Danish Opera (The Magic Flute). September 2002 short bio For further publicity information on this artist, please click here

Gluck's Orphée & Eurydice / Welsh National Opera "This is a dazzling debut for McCreesh ... such instinctive theatricality. In the pit, McCreesh gets WNO's orchestra to sound at times like a period-instrument band, especially in the "horrid" scurrying music of the underworld, in which the strings' cascading scales sound like leaps into the abyss, punctuated by menacing trombones and thunderous drum-rolls. The WNO chorus, excels itself with the grace and power of its singing...the most entrancing and musically thrilling account of this strangely elusive opera that I have ever seen...all told, another WNO triumph." The Sunday Times, October 8, 2000 Handel Messiah / DG (Gabrieli Consort & Players) McCreesh is a natural dramatist…[his] expression is candid and immediate…his is a particular type of musicanship which reaches out, quite Sargent-like in the robust swagger of "And the Glory", the grand leisurely "Amen" and almost elegiac enunciation in "Comfort ye". The energy and focused proclamation of this reading will surely win many friends…there is a consistency and rooted concentration to proceedings [which are] always thoroughly engaged. A highly compelling reading. A Messiah for the millennium? Certainly, one of the best around. Gramophone Handel Theodora (Gabrieli Consort & Players) Paul McCreesh inspired superb playing with a warmth and body to the sound not always associated with period bands. The Times The performance came in at just under three hours, but the time sailed by. This was thanks not least to the brisk, indeed reckless, pace at which McCreesh directed much of the faster music, which counterpointed the brash, pagan Romans against the plangent voices of Theodora and her entourage. The Daily Telegraph McCreesh’s conducting brings out the best in the work. The Guardian Handel Solomon / DG (Gabrieli Consort & Players) At last, Handel’s sumptuous oratorio of 1748 has a recording worthy of its musical riches. The Gabrieli Consort sing Handel’s magnificent double choruses with inspirational fervour under Paul McCreesh’s thrilling direction. The Sunday Times Schutz Christmas Vespers / DG (Gabrieli Consort & Players) The whole sequence is executed with the skill and flair we have come to expect from McCreesh and his assembled forces. The Times McCreesh brilliantly evokes a liturgical atmosphere in this vivid recording, throwing new light on the devotional purpose at the heart of its performance. An uplifting record. The Sunday Times Voted one of the TOP 100 Conductor’s of the 20th Century McCreesh's great and defining gift is a startling ability to marry erudition and imagination to revelatory effect …. even greater things can be expected. Classic CD Magazine