Hans Nieuwenhuis
Hans Nieuwenhuis studied law at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam before devoting his professional life to theatre as an actor, designer, writer, and ultimately as a stage director. He assisted several renowned opera stage directors, including Götz Friedrich, Harry Kupfer, John Cox, David Pountney, Lotfi Mansouri, and John Copley, and made his directing debut with the Netherlands Opera in 1979, where he was resident stage director from 1979–1984, directing new productions of La Bohème, Parsifal, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Rita, The Old Maid and the Thief (Menotti), and several world premieres.
His international career began in 1981, staging the USA premiere of Philip Glass’ Satyagraha for the Brooklyn Academy of Music and the Art Park Festival. He went on to direct more than 80 productions worldwide, for companies including L’Opéra de Nice, The Canadian Opera Company, San Francisco Opera, Manitoba Opera, L’Opéra de Montréal, Opera Colorado, Long Beach Opera, Hawaii Opera Theatre, Western Opera Theater, Opera Omaha, Lincoln Center New York, Pacific Opera Victoria, and Bangkok Opera, among many others across Europe, Asia, and North America. For L’Opéra de Nice he staged new productions of Il turco in Italia and Der Zigeunerbaron, and for the Canadian Opera Company he directed The Return of Ulysses, The Tales of Hoffmann, La Traviata, Tchaikovsky’s Pique Dame, and several world premieres. For San Francisco Opera’s Merola Program and Western Opera Theater he staged a new Carmen, which toured extensively throughout the United States and Japan, and he later returned to San Francisco Opera to direct a successful production of The Magic Flute.
Further credits include Salome for Opera Colorado, Fidelio for Opera Omaha, The Magic Flute for the Festival Auvers-sur-Oise in France, Bluebeard’s Castle for Yale Opera, Cabildo (composed by Amy Beach, 1932) for Lincoln Center, and Die Fledermaus for the OK Mozart Festival, Opera McGill, and Opera Studio Nederland. He also directed a new La Bohème for Opera Studio Nederland and Johann Strauss’ Der Zigeunerbaron for Pacific Opera Victoria in Canada. In Thailand he directed the world premiere of Ayodhya by Somtow Sucharitkul for Bangkok Opera to international acclaim, and his production of Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia, also created for Bangkok Opera, was subsequently performed for audiences in Hanoi, Vietnam. Mr. Nieuwenhuis has collaborated with many renowned conductors, including Richard Bonynge, Christopher Keene, Edo de Waart, Hans Vonk, Nicholas McGegan, Jean Fournet, and Ton Koopman. Recent projects include Dido and Aeneas for Opera Zuid in Holland and L’Opéra Royal de Wallonie in Belgium, Le Nozze di Figaro for Hawaii Opera Theatre, Die Fledermaus for International Opera Projects in the Netherlands and Belgium, and Così fan tutte for Opera Studio Nederland.
For over three decades, Hans Nieuwenhuis has devoted himself to aspiring young opera singers, teaching and directing for the Canadian Opera Company Ensemble, the San Francisco Opera Merola Program, the Curtis Institute of Music, Yale University, Michigan University, McGill University, the conservatories of Utrecht, Amsterdam, and Maastricht, the Sichuan and Ningxia Conservatories in China, and the Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Moscow. He is a regular guest teacher at the Opera Studio of the National Theatre in Tokyo, and has given masterclasses across the Netherlands, the USA, Thailand, Russia, Germany, Hungary, Croatia, Italy, France, Canada, Austria, Belgium, Estonia, Japan, Ukraine, Oman, and China. He recently returned to Yale University to direct two opera evenings and worked again with singers of the New National Theatre Opera Studio in Tokyo; he currently works with young singers in the Netherlands, France, Belgium, Estonia, New York, China, and Canada, as well as summer programmes in France and Italy, and remains active as a guest teacher, speaker, casting advisor, and opera consultant. This season he directed Poulenc’s La Voix Humaine in Haarlem, the Netherlands.
Hans Nieuwenhuis has served as a jury member at many prestigious singing competitions, including the Hans Gabor-Belvedere Competition in Vienna, the Marmande Competition in France, the Arena di Verona Competition in Italy, Les Jeunes Ambassadeurs Lyriques in Canada, the Young Opera Singers Competition in Izmir, Turkey, and the Klaudia Taev Competition in Estonia, among others. He was recently a judge for the Dutch IVC Competition in Den Bosch, and is a regular member of the Selection Committee for Les Jeunes Ambassadeurs Lyriques in various cities across Canada.
Mr. Nieuwenhuis was founder and, from 1992–2011, General Director of Opera Studio Nederland in Amsterdam, an extensive training programme for young singers from around the world, funded by the Dutch government. He is currently General Director of the Orfeo Foundation, an international organisation established to promote collaboration between young-artist programmes and to advise young opera singers.
In April 2012, Hans Nieuwenhuis was appointed Knight of the Order of Orange-Nassau by Her Majesty Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands for his work in opera, theatre, and music.