CREATIVE TEAM

NICHOLAS CHALMERS: conductor
Nicholas Chalmers is the Director of Music at Westminster Abbey Choir School, Musical Director of the Bromley Youth Choirs and Musical Director of Second Movement. Nicholas began his musical training as a chorister at Tewkesbury Abbey.  After a year as Organ Scholar at Chichester Cathedral, Nicholas studied music at Oxford University where he was Organ Scholar of Lincoln College and conductor of the Oxford University Chamber Choir. After graduating, Nicholas spent a year as the Michael James Organ Scholar at St Paul’s Cathedral, London. In August 2001, Nicholas moved to Lodi, Northern Italy, where he spent a year working with the choir of the cathedral and studying with the harpsichordist, Laura Bertani, at the Piacenza Conservatoire. Nicholas has directed two productions as musical director of Hand Made Opera; Le Nozze di Figaro (2002) and Il Barbiere di Siviglia (2003).  For Second Movement he has directed Mozart and Salieri (October 2004) and Trouble in Tahiti (June 2005) The Medium and Impresario (January 2006) to wide critical acclaim and directed their triple bill of Les Deux Aveugles, Rothschild’s Violin and The Knife’s Tears at the Covent Garden Film Studios (May 2007). Nicholas was chorus master for Beatrice di Tenda for the Chelsea Opera Group in March 2007 and looks forward to working with them again in autumn 2007. Nicholas directs the music at St. Jude-on-the-hill, Hampstead Garden Suburbs. Nicholas currently holds the choral conducting scholarship with the London Symphony Chorus and studies conducting with Denise Ham.

OLIVER MEARS: director
For Second Movement Oliver Mears has directed site-specific opera productions of Martinu's The Knife's Tears and Shostakovich/Fleischmann's Rothschild's Violin (both UK Stage premieres), Offenbach's The Two Blind Men (Covent Garden Film Studios), Mozart's The Impresario and Menotti's The Medium (Covent Garden Film Studios), Bernstein's Trouble in Tahiti (Hoxton Hall) and Rimsky-Korsakov's Mozart and Salieri (Grosvenor Chapel Mayfair). He has also directed Cavailli's La Calisto for the Early Opera Company, Iford Festival. Previous theatre productions as director include Strindberg's Creditors, Barker's Judith and Ionescu's Lesson (all Kings Head), My Brother's Keeper (Edinburgh, Pleasance), a rehearsed reading of a new adaptation of Chekhov's Ward 6 for the Caird Company, as well as Gogol's The Government Inspector, John Ford's 'Tis Pity She's a Whore, Middleton's The Changeling, The Importance of Being Earnest, Mein Kampf (by Jewish-Hungarian playwright George Tabori), and The Letter. He also wrote (with the Oxford Revue) and directed a new musical version of Aristophanes' The Birds at the Oxford Playhouse.

After assisting radical playwright Howard Barker on two world premieres (Und, He Stumbled), he went on to work at the Arcola theatre in Dalston and at the Kings Head Theatre, Islington, as a trainee assistant director; he has since assisted directors including Steven Pimlott, Christopher Alden, Sally Potter, Neil Armfield and Irina Brown, working as assistant and staff director at the Royal Opera House, La Scala Milan, English National Opera and Welsh National Opera. In particular much of his assistant work has been with Richard Jones, including work on his Olivier Award-winning production of Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk (Royal Opera House) and the world premiere of Gerald Barry's The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant (English National Opera), as well as his acclaimed productions of Lulu and The Trojans (ENO). Oliver has also recently completed a new production of Sweeny Todd for Pimlico Opera . He has also assisted Irina Brown on filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky's production of Boris Godunov (ROH). Future plans include directing productions of operas by Weill and Massanet for Second Movement and a new production of Hansel and Gretel for Opera North Education.

SIMON HOLDSWORTH: set and costume designer
Simon Holdsworth trained at Wimbledon School of Art, London and the Kunstacademie, Maastricht. Designs for Second Movement include a triple bill of “The Two Blind Men”, “Rothschild’s Violin” and “The Knife’s Tears”; a double bill of “The Medium” and “The Impresario” (Covent Garden Film Studios, London) and “Trouble in Tahiti” (Hoxton Hall), all directed by Oliver Mears and conducted by Nicholas Chalmers. More recently he designed “The Merry Widow” (Hyogo Performing Arts Centre, Japan) directed by Isao Hirowatari. Working with director Annilese Miskimmon Simon designed “Orlando” (Opera Theatre Company, Ireland), “Bluebeard” (Buxton Festival) and “Rinaldo” (RSAMD, Scotland). Working in theatre Simon designed “Screwmachine” (Assembly Rooms, Edinburgh), directed by John Clancy. With Steven Berkoff directing he designed, “Richard II” (Ludlow Festival), “Messiah” (Old Vic, London) and “The Secret Love Life of Ophelia” (London, Edinburgh and Denmark). Repertory theatre designs include “Ritual in Blood” (Nottingham Playhouse), directed by Timothy Walker and “Dracula” (Derby Playhouse). On London’s fringe he designed “’Tis Pity She’s a Whore” (Southwark Playhouse) and “The Invisible Monkey” (New End Theatre), directed by Linda Marlowe. For dance Simon designed “Frigidaire” (Place Theatre, London), choreographed by Lea Helmstädter and working in television he designed “The Waltz King” (BBC), directed by Rupert Edwards.