Oxford post for exCovent Garden chief
NewsThe opera director John Fulljames has been appointed Director of Oxford University’s Humanities Cultural Programme, which sounds like a sinecure. But it involves creating a 500-seat concert hall and a 250-seat theatre to open in 2025.
Fulljames was Director of Opera at the Royal Danish Opera and Royal Danish Orchestra from 2017 until this year; before that, he was previously Associate Director of Opera at Covent Garden.
It’s great to have John back in the UK but this is a white elephant project. Oxford so deserves a proper concert hall but 500 seats is just too small to give this venue a chance of survival, and 250 seats in a theatre is basically a fringe venue. Apparently this is the largest gift ever or some such and it’s a shame that it’s been wasted on such a meagre outcome. It will never be able to stand on its own two feet and is a mere vanity project for the academics running it. Plus a Trump-supporting donor, in it up the elbows apparently, means this is a typically compromised “gift”. Better than the Saudis I suppose, but only just? All in all I wish John luck but if anyone’s taking bets that he’ll leave before the place opens, I’m buying.
Here in Oxford, we could do with a dedicated concert hall, given that we’re currently limited to the somewhat uncomfortable and facility-lacking Sheldonian for orchestral concerts or the Holywell Music Room for recitals. The only other (non-school, non-Gown) classical music venues are St John the Evangelist Church on Iffley Road and the ‘intimate’ Jacqueline du Pre Music Building at St Hilda’s.
Great news for Oxford, but I do hope that John isn’t lost to the opera world, and especially as a stage director.