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Graham Vick
Paul Brown
Massimiliano Stefanelli
He has a strong collaborative relationship with the Fondazione Toscanini Orchestra and Franco Zeffirelli conducting new productions of Aida and La Traviata which have subsequently toured all over the world and have been recorded for DVD. His strong affinity for opera and his extensive knowledge of the operatic repertoire have led to conducting engagements all over the world. In the UK he has conducted the English Chamber Orchestra for their recording of Mozart’s The Magic Flute. His most recent operatic triumphs have been Andrea Chenier, Tosca and Don Giovanni with Ruggero Raimondi in Georgio Strehler’s legendary production. La Traviata will be Massmiliano Stefanelli’s debut with Birmingham Opera Company and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra.
Ron Howell
His interest in Dance History and his work with the leading authority, Belinda Quirey, laid the foundations for his career in Opera. The combination of acting, classical and contemporary dance skills and a thorough knowledge of music and dance history proved invaluable. To date he has worked in the world’s major opera houses including La Scala, Milan; The Metropolitan Opera, New York; Royal Opera House, Covent Garden; The Kirov, St Petersburg; Lyric Opera, Chicago and in 2007 he will working with Placido Domingo in Madrid. He has worked with many of the world’s leading directors including Francesca Zambello, Peter Stein, Keith Warner and Graham Vick with whom he has collaborated for more than 16 years. He has also worked with many of the world’s leading conductors including Sir Bernard Haitink, Valery Gergiev, James Levine, Ricardo Muti and Vladimir Jurowski. Ron is an Associate Director as well as Movement Director & Choregrapher for Birmingham Opera Company and has been as Associate Director at the Royal Opera House.
Giuseppe di iorio
Previous productions with Graham Vick include: Die Walkure, Lisbon; The Magic Flute, Bolshoi, Moscow; Orfeo & Euridice Ravenna and Anna Bolena, Verona. Giuseppe has just lit The Importance of Being Ernest, Theatre Royal Bath Tour, Dir. Peter Gill with Penelope Keith, and L’Elisir d’Amore, Glyndebourne, Dir. Annabel Arden. Current and recent work: Il Trittico, Opera Zuid; The Shops, world premiere by Edward Rushton, Dir. John Fulljames, Bregenz Festival, Linbury, ROH, and Tour; Carmen, Operaoggi, Dir. Franco Ripa di Meana; Tamerlano, Scottish Opera; Manon, Dir/Des. Antony McDonald, and Turn of the Screw, revival, both for Nationale Reisopera, Holland; The Marriage of Figaro, Opera North; Faust, Bordeaux Opera,Salome, Malmo; Otello, Salzburg 2008. Previous productions:.Faust, Rome and Turin with Dir. Hugo Deana; Aida, Cagliari, with Dir. Stephen Medcalf; Il trovatore (Nurnberg), Macbeth (Munster), Otello (Kiel) – all set design and lighting, Dir. Inge Levant; Aida, Knot Garden, Scottish Opera and King Priam National Reisopera, Holland, Dir. Antony McDonald. In 2008 Giuseppe designs the set and lighting for Carmen in Saarbucken, Germany with Dir. Inge Levant.
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Graham Vick is the Artistic Director of Birmingham Opera Company and works in the world’s major opera houses with the world’s leading conductors: Riccardo Muti, James Levine, Bernard Haitink, Valery Gergiev, Seiji Ozawa, Zubin Mehta. He was Director of Productions at Scottish Opera (1984-1987) and at Glyndebourne (1994-2000). His many awards include the Premi Abbiati three times and The South Bank Show Awards for Opera in both 1999 and 2002. He is a Chevalier de L’Ordres des Arts et des Lettres, Honorary Professor of Music at the University of Birmingham and was Visiting Professor of Opera Studies at Oxford University in 2002/3. Recent productions: The Magic Flute at Salzburg Festival and Bolshoi Opera, Moscow; Onegin at La Scala. In May he began The Ring Cycle for Lisbon with Das Rheingold. 
Born in Glamorgan, he trained under Margaret Harris. Opera designs include Mitridate, re di Ponto, Falstaff, I Masnadieri, The Midsummer Marriage, Tosca (ROH); King Arthur (ROH, Châtelet); Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, Moses und Aron (Met); Tannhauser (San Francisco Opera); Die Zauberflöte (Salzburg); Pelléas et Mélisande, Lulu, The Turn of the Screw (Glyndebourne); Peter Grimes, Parsifal (Opéra National de Paris); Don Carlos (Sydney); Rigoletto (Madrid); Thaïs (Chicago); Kát’a Kabanová, Lucio Silla, The Tempest (Santa Fe); L’incoronazione di Poppea (Bologna); La Traviata, Anna Bolena (Verona); Mephistopheles (Amsterdam); Die Zauberflöte (Bolshoi); Elektra (Mariinsky St Petersburg); He Had It Coming, Fidelio (BOC). Other credits include The Tempest, Richard II, Coriolanus, King Lear, Platonov, Naked (Almeida); Hamlet (Tokyo, Sadler’s Wells); Giselle (La Scala); Man of La Mancha (Broadway). Films include Angels and Insects, Up at the Villa. 
Massimiliano Stefanelli graduated in composition and conducting from Santa Cecilia Music Academy in Rome. At the beginning of his conducting career he worked and studied extensively in the USA assisting eminent conductors of the calibre of James Levine, Spiros Argris and Alain Lombard refining his knowledge of an extensive repertoire. He has worked with many of the world’s major opera companies including the Metropolitan Opera, New York; the Bolshoi Opera, Moscow and the Israeli Opera in Tel Aviv. In the USA he has been Guest Conductor of the Wolf Trap Festival in Washington and for the Spoleto Festival where he was appointed Director of Concerts and oversaw the casting and selection of young musicians from all over the world. He has also worked extensively in his home country of Italy with many of the major opera houses including Parma, Florence, Rome, Genoa, Naples, Ravenna and Cagliari. 
After training at the Nottingham Academy of Speech & Drama Ron discovered his vocation as a dancer. Following an intensive period of study he was accepted into the prestigious London School of Contemporary Dance where he discovered modern contemporary dance changing his life, his outlook and his understanding of dance, theatre, music and drama. This formed the foundation of his successful career as a dancer and choreographer which has spanned more than 20 years.
Born in Naples, Italy and trained at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.