Wales summons stop-gap to run its national opera
NewsWelsh National Opera has been unable to find a permanent successor to general director Aidan Lang, who retires this month.
It has called in Christopher Barron as interim chief. He is a former CEO of Birmingham Royal Ballet and Scottish Opera and Scottish Ballet,
as well as artistic director and CEO of Brighton Festival and Dome.
“Unable to find” suggests that WNO was in the process of recruiting a permanent general director. But they previously announced their strategy to recruit an interim director to stabilise the company prior to a new permanent appointment.
Perhaps they did recruit for whatever the title or length, and no one forthcoming and so had to rely on word of mouth and direct headhunting and go begging?
Surely a stop-gap is better than a total gap?
Chris is a very experienced, steady pair of hands, who gets on with the job quietly, undemonstratively and efficiently. He’s also a really nice person. He started his professional life as a (lowly) stage hand and has worked his way up by just being good at whatever job in theatre, music, festivals and ballet that he’s done. He genuinely seems to care about the people he works with: when times are tough (thinking back especially to his time at Scottish Opera and Ballet) and he has to make difficult decisions that affect people’s lives he really cares about the individuals as well as the company. Maybe on SD we’ll hear otherwise, but I’ve rarely heard anyone say a bad word about him, which is a considerable compliment for a major UK Arts CEO.
Aren’t Stuart Murphy and Cressida Pollack available?
Odd headline. Weird article. WNO has secured ( Drummond??) a really experienced and successful senior creative to steer it while it reflects and consults as to the best structure for the next phase of its development.