Monday, April 29, 2013
Thanks for looking at my blog at this site...
But I now have a spanking new website with blog attached which I'd love you to visit
Please follow this link
William Kerley's New Website
See you there!!
William Kerley
Monday, April 15, 2013
Basil Coleman RIP - A Tribute
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Wednesday, January 30, 2013
My new production of POWDER HER FACE in Philadelphia
Getting ready to head back to Opera Company of Philadelphia, or Opera Philadelphia as we now must learn to call it..
Having meetings there about my new production of Thomas Ades' POWDER HER FACE which opens in June
follow this link for more info:
POWDER HER FACE OPERA COMPANY OF PHILADELPHIA
Wednesday, October 10, 2012
Monday, July 23, 2012
Castleton Festival 2012
Congratulations to all concerned on another successful Castleton Festival - not even a hurricane could stop it!
New production of BARBER OF SEVILLE
and the production of CARMEN that I made at the Teatro Petruzzelli in Bari earlier this year...
... were remarkable successes under the baton of the founding father himself, Maestro Lorin Maazel... here he is conducting last year's new production of LA BOHEME which we'll take to the Royal Opera House, Oman, this November...
Friday, January 13, 2012
Monday, December 05, 2011
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Back in Beijing - Barber of Seville at NCPA
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The production is a co-production between the Castleton Festival and the NCPA & opens on 24th November 2011.
Here's a link to the NCPA website with more details..
Sunday, July 31, 2011
British Youth Opera - Marriage of Figaro
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I've just started rehearsals for my new production of Marriage of Figaro with the brilliant young performers from British Youth Opera - my fourth show for this wonderful company....
Here's a link to the BYO website...
British Youth Opera Homepage
Monday, July 25, 2011
Thursday, March 10, 2011
And so to San Francisco..
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I'm making my way to Berkeley to direct Britten's Rape of Lucretia and Albert Herring at the building in the picture below - the Zellerbach Hall.
Maestro Lorin Maazel is conducting all the performances...
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Follow this link for more news of our Cal Performances residency...
Castleton Festival at CAL Performances
Tuesday, December 07, 2010
Short Montage of Castleton Festival
Here's a short montage 2 and a half minutes or so - of the Castleton Festival 2010 from the superb documenary maker, Scott Willis...
Castleton Festival Montage
Castleton Festival Montage
Scott Willis's Film of Castleton Festival 2010
Please watch a brilliant short documentary about Castleton Festival 2010 shot by the excellent Scott Willis here -
Castleton Festival Documentary 2010
It features great footage of some of the new opera productions I directed at Castleton this year...
Castleton Festival Documentary 2010
It features great footage of some of the new opera productions I directed at Castleton this year...
Saturday, November 20, 2010
English National Opera TheatreCraft Masterclass
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On Monday 22nd November as part of TheatreCraft 2010 I'll be giving a directing masterclass at English National Opera.
TheatreCraft Masterclasses are for 17-25 year-olds who are interested in pursuing careers in the performing arts.
More information at this website:
English National Opera TheatreCraft Masterclasses 2010
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Washington Post on Castleton Festival 2011
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Follow this link to the Washington Post's piece about next year's Castleton Festival - by Anne Midgette
The Washington Post on the Castleton Festival 2011
Following this month's Press Launch at the Willard Hotel, Washington DC
Castleton Festival Press Launch on Chinese TV!
Here's the footage from Chinese TV covering our Washington DC Press Launch for the Castleton Festival 2011...
Castleton Festival Washington DC Press Launch on Chinese Television
Castleton Festival Washington DC Press Launch on Chinese Television
Friday, October 01, 2010
Saturday, September 04, 2010
London - Paris - Bath - New York City
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On Thursday - off to New York for various meetings & plenty of work with Nick Vaughan, designer, on our new productions for next year...
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And, in between, a joyous occasion in Bath - the marriage, at Bath Guildhall,
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of my friends Natasha Pryce and William Harris... & a perfect wedding reception at Essington Court in the village of Midford nearby...
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Natasha is a brilliant young director & was my assistant when I directed La Fille du Regiment at Opera Holland Park in 2008...
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William Harris is the inspired and inspiring leader of the theatre courses at Middlesex University...
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjw60AxOWWEggLJDmuLD4lYRQf7Zmhu_rPK_mCq1E7pxdiQqplgFrb8uWpiMmLl-GsaT0FEVdlPIsg-T8lZjHAyEYSTi8jlaC5U5bOdvMU1IVxHQdAj5VPAqVJc7y75aLzfWs5bvA/s200/middlesex_1.jpg)
And, at the wedding, it was great to meet the Best Man - a man I'd previously known by name only - his name is Torquil MacLeod and he's the producer of Radio 4's excellent Saturday Review.....
Wednesday, August 04, 2010
Washington Post on Castleton Festival Stavinsky/de Falla Double Bill
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Here's a link to Anne Midgette's review of my productions of Stravinsky's SOLDIER'S TALE and de Falla's MASTER PETER'S PUPPET SHOW which played this year at the Castleton Festival...
Washington Post Review of Soldier's Tale/Master Peter's Puppet Show
Thursday, July 15, 2010
Wednesday, July 07, 2010
Financial Times on Trittico at Castleton Festival
Il Trittico, Castleton Festival, US
By George Loomis
Published: July 6 2010
Lorin Maazel began his musical career as a child prodigy and as he enters his ninth decade retains a capacity for music-making that can only be called prodigious. For several years, his estate in Virginia has been a gathering point for young musicians under Maazel’s tutelage, activities that last year blossomed into the Castleton Festival. This year it returns with an enlarged schedule (four crowded July weekends) and an enlarged principal venue.
The opening attraction, a new production of Puccini’s Il Trittico by resident stage director William Kerley, Maazel conducting, shows that it is growing artistically as well, with a slew of talented young singers deployed in Puccini’s triptych of one-act operas. The locales – a river boat for the lurid Il Tabarro, a convent for the religiosity of Suor Angelica, a Florentine townhouse for the romp Gianni Schicchi – demand more than a unit set. Nicholas Vaughan’s design achieves unity by fashioning a detailed boat and a cloistered square out of beige wood.
Yet Gianni Schicchi is the most imaginative of the three. In this tale of deception, the late Buoso Donati’s home has leather-and-chrome furniture and modern art, including a glass-encased stuffed mule – an objet d’art Donati’s’s heirs squabble over in lieu of the live animal Puccini left unseen. Corey Crider’s Gianni Schicchi is convincing, with Matthew Plenk bringing an appealingly light tenor to Rinuccio’s salute to Florence. Joyce El-Khoury showed promise as Schicchi’s daughter, so one was happy to encounter her again, replacing an ill colleague in the title role of Suor Angelica (performed last, in a departure from normal practice). You have to wince at Puccini’s clichéd depiction of convent life, but the plight of Angelica, cast off by her aristocratic family, is hard to resist. El-Khoury’s textured soprano serves the music beautifully, and Maria Isabel Vera is formidable as her cold-hearted aunt, the Principessa.
Il Tabarro yields another excellent soprano, Jessica Klein, in lustrous, resonant voice as Giorgetta. Noah Stewart sings Luigi with such tenorial power that it is almost implausible when Michele (Nicholas Pallesen), Giorgetta’s cuckolded husband, strangles him. Maazel drew an assured performance from his players that nicely projected the music’s colourful details. www.castletonfestival.org
Financial Times on Trittico Castleton Festival
By George Loomis
Published: July 6 2010
Lorin Maazel began his musical career as a child prodigy and as he enters his ninth decade retains a capacity for music-making that can only be called prodigious. For several years, his estate in Virginia has been a gathering point for young musicians under Maazel’s tutelage, activities that last year blossomed into the Castleton Festival. This year it returns with an enlarged schedule (four crowded July weekends) and an enlarged principal venue.
The opening attraction, a new production of Puccini’s Il Trittico by resident stage director William Kerley, Maazel conducting, shows that it is growing artistically as well, with a slew of talented young singers deployed in Puccini’s triptych of one-act operas. The locales – a river boat for the lurid Il Tabarro, a convent for the religiosity of Suor Angelica, a Florentine townhouse for the romp Gianni Schicchi – demand more than a unit set. Nicholas Vaughan’s design achieves unity by fashioning a detailed boat and a cloistered square out of beige wood.
Yet Gianni Schicchi is the most imaginative of the three. In this tale of deception, the late Buoso Donati’s home has leather-and-chrome furniture and modern art, including a glass-encased stuffed mule – an objet d’art Donati’s’s heirs squabble over in lieu of the live animal Puccini left unseen. Corey Crider’s Gianni Schicchi is convincing, with Matthew Plenk bringing an appealingly light tenor to Rinuccio’s salute to Florence. Joyce El-Khoury showed promise as Schicchi’s daughter, so one was happy to encounter her again, replacing an ill colleague in the title role of Suor Angelica (performed last, in a departure from normal practice). You have to wince at Puccini’s clichéd depiction of convent life, but the plight of Angelica, cast off by her aristocratic family, is hard to resist. El-Khoury’s textured soprano serves the music beautifully, and Maria Isabel Vera is formidable as her cold-hearted aunt, the Principessa.
Il Tabarro yields another excellent soprano, Jessica Klein, in lustrous, resonant voice as Giorgetta. Noah Stewart sings Luigi with such tenorial power that it is almost implausible when Michele (Nicholas Pallesen), Giorgetta’s cuckolded husband, strangles him. Maazel drew an assured performance from his players that nicely projected the music’s colourful details. www.castletonfestival.org
Financial Times on Trittico Castleton Festival
Saturday, July 03, 2010
Interview with Marlyn Cooley of WETA Classical Radio
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Thursday, July 01, 2010
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Castleton Festival 2010 contd..
All three productions of TRITTICO brewing nicely - Maestro Maazel back in Castleton & having music calls...
Meant to say I've joined Twitter...
You can follow me at twitter.com/WillKerley
I have a select band of 28 followers....!
Fame at last!
Meant to say I've joined Twitter...
You can follow me at twitter.com/WillKerley
I have a select band of 28 followers....!
Fame at last!
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Castleton Festival 2010
Greetings from sultry Virginia...
I'm back at Castleton, this time thankfully with wife Claire and son Thomas & am rehearsing Puccini's TRITTICO in the great new Castleton Festival Tent.
The singers are completely amazing - big stars of the future.
Nick Vaughan has created an incredible set & Rie Ono my fab lighting designer seems to have a bigger rig than ever!
The talented Jonathan Solari is reviving my productions of Beggar's Opera and The Turn of the Screw in the Theatre (Theater) House.
I then go into rehearsals for the de Falla - Master Peter's Puppet Show and Stravinsky's Soldier's Tale.
It's going to a terrific festival. Check out the Castleton Festival web pages, please.
Maestro Maazel gets here on Thursday & I'm so looking forward to working with him again.
I'm back at Castleton, this time thankfully with wife Claire and son Thomas & am rehearsing Puccini's TRITTICO in the great new Castleton Festival Tent.
The singers are completely amazing - big stars of the future.
Nick Vaughan has created an incredible set & Rie Ono my fab lighting designer seems to have a bigger rig than ever!
The talented Jonathan Solari is reviving my productions of Beggar's Opera and The Turn of the Screw in the Theatre (Theater) House.
I then go into rehearsals for the de Falla - Master Peter's Puppet Show and Stravinsky's Soldier's Tale.
It's going to a terrific festival. Check out the Castleton Festival web pages, please.
Maestro Maazel gets here on Thursday & I'm so looking forward to working with him again.
Saturday, May 08, 2010
The Britten Project - California - 2011
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The Rape of Lucretia is my Chateauville Foundation production which played last year at the Opera Company of Philadelphia. I'm thrilled I'm getting the chance to take the shows out west!
Maestro Lorin Maazel will be conducting the performances of both operas.
Please follow this link for more details of the CAL Performances:
Thursday, April 22, 2010
Back from Castleton & going Punk at Guildhall...
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Strange to be in rehearsal at Castleton without any singers. While there's singing in the de Falla, I wanted to work hard with Emily DeCola and her colleagues from The Puppet Kitchen, an amazing puppet company from New York City, and will add the singers later... the story is based on an episode from Cervantes Don Quixote - where our anti-hero gets confused by the plot of a puppet show he sees & ends up destroying both set and puppets - much to the chagrin of Master Peter, the puppet master...
And the Stravinsky (more a piece of music-theatre than an opera) features the talents of a tremendous quartet of actor/dancers with whom I spent the week unlocking the piece with the terrific choreographer, Faye Driscoll.
As soon as I get back to Castleton in mid-June, I'll be straight into rehearsals for our new production, in the Festival Tent, of Puccini's TRITTICO and, since I can't be in two places at once, wanted to have had a look at the action for the Stravinsky/de Falla double bill before then.
Once the Puccini has opened, I'll be straight into rehearsals for the double-bill again - it opens in the last weekend of the Festival - the last week of July.
On another note, I feel immensely lucky that I was able to catch the flight I'd originally booked - on 21st April - but it'd been touch and go for the last week if I'd be able to fly home, or my flight would be cancelled and I'd go to the back of the queue. Plenty of poor souls are still stranded... so I'm not quite sure how it all worked out for me...
Thankfully I made it safely home & on time.... I start rehearsals for my new GSMD production of Britten's ALBERT HERRING on 28th - I think the folk at Guildhall were worried I wouldn't be back in time (so was I!)
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This time I'm updating Albert Herring to the 1970s.... power cuts, Thatcher, Punk Rock...
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RIP Malcolm Maclaren, the veritable Godfather of Punk.... who's been very much in mind as I've been preparing for rehearsals....
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Friday, March 19, 2010
Flying Visit to Valencia
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Spent a good day talking through the pieces we're to present at this year's Castleton Festival. The press release about the season has now been published, so I can let you in on the news....
In Valencia I read all the parts myself (!) of Jeremy Sams' excellent translation of Stravinsky's Soldier's Tale, which we're presenting at Castleton in a double bill with de Falla's Master Peter's Puppet Show.
I've cast some hugely talented actor/dancers from New York, and I'm working with a brilliant company called The Puppet Kitchen as well as the excellent Faye Driscoll, the hottest choreographer in NYC.
We're also creating a new production, in the (even bigger this year!) Castleton Festival Tent, of Puccini's 3 one-act operas which together make up his Trittico.
And revivals of my Castleton Productions of Britten's Turn of the Screw and Beggar's Opera.
Please visit www.chateauville.org for more details...
Monday, January 25, 2010
London - NYC - New Haven - Philadelphia - London
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The Castleton Festival 2010 season is yet to be announced, a press release is imminent, so I can't (yet) reveal here details of the new productions.
But I can let you know that, along with my long time collaborators, the designer Nick Vaughan and the lighting designer Rie Ono, I will be collaborating with Emily DeCola and Eric Wright, the brilliant puppeteers from New York's PUPPET KITCHEN.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsOWgyRt7Q7cPABGa8I8JJKSsZcZ-Fvk79N_H0Yj29xNWmSSGinfxPTgWdVSg57quRmnE2YAlcEoS467-EFTIwjiPfZBUOnVWM8CqJAtuPiC7ijEfn6ybYC1bzUlfjBoyZEoLRKA/s400/3824199399_ce91a3616f.jpg)
I went out to New Haven, Connecticut, to meet Emily and Eric, where they are currently in rehearsal at Yale Rep for the world premiere of a new play by Rinne Groff called Compulsion - it's being directed by the artistic director of the New York Public Theater, Oskar Eustis.
And I'm also thrilled to be working this year at Castleton with a fantastic choreographer called Faye Driscoll.
More details to follow of the exciting new productions and revivals this year at Castleton.
While I was that side of the Atlantic I was also able to go down to Philadelphia to meet my esteemed colleagues Robert Driver and David Devan - who run the marvellous Opera Company of Philadelphia - for whom I directed Britten's Rape of Lucretia last year...
Tuesday, January 05, 2010
Albert Herring at Guildhall 2010
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The performances are on the 9th, 11th, 14th and 16th June 2010 at 7pm.
This will be my fourth production with the talented students of the Guildhall Opera Department & I'm much looking forward to returning there...
The production is designed by Tom Rogers, with lighting by Johanna Town.
Wednesday, December 02, 2009
Busy Day in London Town....
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Last night I attended a fantastic concert he gave with the Philharmonia Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall.
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Mahler's 9th Symphony. What can I say?
....Bloody brilliant.
& then this afternoon, off in the rain to Hackney Road, Shoreditch, for a meeting with designer Tom Rogers about our new production at Guildhall Britten's Albert Herring. The production opens in London on June 9th 2010.
Here are a just a few images from the outstanding work Tom has produced for me since we first worked together on a new production of Britten's Let's Make an Opera at the Jubilee Hall in Aldeburgh.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLZQZo304qvxdm6ZwVu-ACJRqcKr5zHqNFz8gV4eghHBEufa3dWj6MR_5-BGmORJpZ6b33f7HfoGqy8XAyStuvkaXYh99b-0UtwEoG0hrbqIfKfmdXhqaIBX4qn43t9kk2-w-DXg/s400/Flight1_1.jpg)
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Oh, and yes - the final one really is a monster computer mouse (!) from our 2007 production of Magic Flute:
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You can see more of Tom Rogers' work at his agent Clare Vidal-Hall's website - follow this link:
Friday, November 27, 2009
British Youth Opera Rake's Progress review at OperaTalent.com...
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Here's another review of my recent BYO production of Rake's Progress from Adam Highbury of OperaTalent.com:
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
New York November....
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I'm out here for a whirlwind week of meetings to plan, with my designer, the super-talented Nick Vaughan and Chateauville Executive Director Doug Beck, our Castleton Festival shows for next year.
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One of the operas we're working on is by Igor Stravinsky (details to follow..) ....(I was lucky enough to direct my first production of his RAKE'S PROGRESS this summer with the wonderful singers of British Youth Opera - see previous pages)
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If I look out from the Chateauville Foundation office window I can see the lights of Essex House. Stravinsky lived the last years of his life here - and died in Essex House in 1971...
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