This summer sees the start of Grange Park Opera’s Der Ring Des Nibelungen with their first instalment – Das Rheingold. Director and Set Designer, Charlie Edwards and Conductor Harry Sever, will be joining us at Swedenborg Hall on 3rd June to share insights into background concepts behind the production, from themes created by the set design and costumes to musical interpretation.
Charlie studied at Central Saint Martins College of Art & Design. As a designer, he has worked with many of the UK’s leading directors on productions for English National Opera including Norma (also Bordeaux), Katya Kabanova (also Lisbon and Liceu, Barcelona), A Midsummer Night’s Dream (also Moscow), Lucia di Lammermoor (also Gothenburg, Teatro Real, Madrid, Norwegian National Opera, Washington, Toronto), Jenufa (also Houston, Santa Fe) and The Makropoulos AWair (also Prague); and for Opera North including Cavalleria rusticana, The Greek Passion, Trouble in Tahiti, Trial by Jury and Tosca (also Opera Australia). Other design credits include Faust (Teatr Wielki, Poznan) Kiss Me Kate (Théâtre du Châtelet, Graz and Les Théâtres de la Ville de Luxembourg), FalstaW (Vienna State Opera), La gazza ladra (Frankfurt), Macbeth (Houston, Chicago), Il trovatore (Metropolitan Opera, New York, Chicago, San Francisco), Le nozze di Figaro (Genoa, Barcelona, Bordeaux, Paris, Tel Aviv), I masnadieri (La Scala Milan), Die tote Stadt(Théâtre du Châtelet) and Attila (Strasbourg, Tel Aviv).
Edwards made his directing debut in 2001 and has since directed / designed productions including Tristan und Isolde (Teatro de São Carlos, Lisbon), Rigoletto and Pagliacci (Opera North), Turandot (Nationale Reisopera).
BBC Music Magazine ‘Rising Star’ conductor Harry Sever studied at Oxford University and trained at the Guildhall School of Music & Royal Academy of Music. A finalist in both the LSO’s Donatella Flick and the Athens International Conducting Competitions, recent and upcoming engagements include Siegfried (Sønderjyllands Symfoniorkester / Den Ny Opera), Cavalleria Rusticana / Aleko / Carmen / The Big Opera
Adventure (Opera North), Die Walküre / Siegfried / The Fairy Queen(Longborough Festival Opera), Fantasio (Garsington), La Traviata (Opera Holland Park), concerts with the orchestra of Welsh National Opera and recordings with the orchestra of Opera North. He was Ring Cycle Conducting Fellow at Longborough Festival Opera between 2022 – 2024, and is currently Music Director of the Cambridge
Philharmonic.
Harry has worked with English National Opera, the Royal Danish Opera, Den Jyske Opera (Danish National Opera), Garsington, Opera Holland Park, the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra at the Grange Festival, and the Britten Sinfonia at Sadler’s Wells. His education work has included projects with The Royal Opera House Covent Garden, The Royal Opera Academy, Copenhagen, British Youth Opera, Birmingham Conservatoire and Trinity Laban Conservatoire .
