Gerry Cornelius was born in London and studied music and conducting at Durham University, the Royal Academy of Music and the State Conservatory of St Petersburg where he was in the class of Ilya Musin. In 2018/2019 season he was appointed Principal Guest Conductor of English National Ballet with whom he has conducted Rite of Spring, Akram Khan’s Giselle, The Nutcracker, Swan Lake and Romeo and Juliet at the London Coliseum, Sadler’s Wells Theatre and the Royal Albert Hall and on various foreign tours. Since making UK début at the Almeida Opera Festival, he has conducted many of leading orchestras, opera and ballet companies at home and abroad, including English National Opera, Welsh National Opera, Opera Group, English Touring Opera, English National Ballet, New York City Ballet, Hong Kong Ballet, London Philharmonic Orchestra, The Hallé, BBC Concert Orchestra, London Sinfonietta, Hong Kong Sinfonietta, the Ruhrtriennale, Klavier-Festival Ruhr, musikFabrik Cologne, Festival d’Automne Paris and Spitalfields Festival.
As well as mainstream repertoire, he is particularly in demand to conduct major new works. These include the world premieres of Tansy Davies’ Between Worlds for English National Opera and Catherine Kontz’s Neige in Luxemburg, the British première of Olga Neuwirth’s American Lulu for the Opera Group at the Edinburgh Festival and subsequently at the Bregenz Festival and the Young Vic, London, Maudite Soit La Guerre for London Sinfonietta, and award-winning new operas and ensemble pieces by George Benjamin, Olga Neuwirth, Thomas Adès, Julian Anderson, Judith Weir, Richard Causton, Tansy Davies, Colin Matthews, Errollyn Wallen, Edward Rushton, Julian Philips and Elena Langer.
In education he has been a visiting conductor and tutor at the University of London Goldsmiths, English National Opera Studio, Royal College Music and Royal Academy of Music. He was the Associate Conductor for the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain and conducted concerts for children with the BBC Concert Orchestra and large scale community projects for WNO and Spitalfields Festival.
Engagements in 2019 include the new production of Macbeth for English Touring Opera, Akram Khan’s Giselle in Luxembourg, Moscow and Madrid and The Nutcracker and Le Corsaire for English National Ballet and Carmon DeLeone’s Peter Pan for Hong Kong Ballet.
click to download images
