NZ Opera’s new head, Brad Cohen: sharing the power of music

Brad Cohen always knew he’d make his life and career in music. “It was always a given,” says the incoming General Director of New Zealand Opera. “I never had to make a choice. I feel very, very lucky.”

Telling his story, he reveals the strategic determination that will stand him in good stead as he steps off the podium into his new leadership role. His predecessor, Thomas de Mallett Burgess, took the cash-strapped NZ Opera in new directions, including small-scale and contemporary repertoire and fewer mainstage productions, his five years in the role attracting controversy and opposition from traditionalists. Cohen and the company’s board nonetheless plan to build on his approach.

Born in Mauritius to Australian missionary parents, Cohen began his “long, circuitous musical journey” in Wellington, New Zealand, playing Suzuki violin aged four. Back in Sydney, he became a chorister, attending St Andrews Cathedral School on a scholarship. 

“That was wonderful training. As a chorister you’re working at a high level of professionalism before you’re aware of what you’re doing. And it was like a brotherhood; we all grew up together in Sydney. Many of my fellow choristers now work for Australian Opera or are international singers.”

He turned to the organ when his voice broke. The surprisingly forward-looking teenager was already planning his next step, one that meant leaving Australia and his family. “I was determined to be an organ scholar at Oxford or Cambridge, and knew I needed to get into the British system before A levels.” Aged 16, he won organ and academic scholarships to the Kings School, attached to Canterbury Cathedral in England. “Off I went without a second thought in the world.”

He was terribly homesick. “Going from life as a day pupil in Sydney to an English boarding school at the close of the Empire was rough. Two Australian students before me had left, unable to cope, so the scholarships included the condition that I returned to Sydney for holidays.”

Cohen’s studies unfolded as planned, the talented musician winning an organ scholarship for university studies at St John’s College, Oxford. But discontent and change were coming.

“I wasn’t enjoying the organ and felt frustrated by the narrowness of the church repertoire I’d sung since I was eight.” His childhood piano teacher from Sydney was working with the London Sinfonietta under Simon Rattle and took him to a rehearsal to meet the famous conductor. Returning to Oxford on the bus, he determined to give orchestral conducting a go.

A year in Munich after university was another watershed. He studied conducting with Romanian Sergiu Celibiache, then conductor of the Munich Philharmonic, and with Leonard Bernstein in Strasbourg. “And I got into opera,” he smiles. He was considering working as a repetiteur on the opera circuit but a scholarship in opera conducting at the Royal College of Music took him back to London. He conducted Benjamin Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia at the College, and his operatic career began.

“It was ironic,” says Cohen now. “I was sick of church music and choirs and wanted to get into the orchestral world, but I’ve ended up working constantly with the voice. The power of the singing voice has always been a big part of my life.”

In 1994, aged 28, Cohen won the prestigious Leeds Conductors Competition. He describes the prize as “massive, a big step forward. It was already clear I was going to be an opera conductor, but I wanted to strengthen the symphonic side of my work, and winning the Leeds gave me a calling card for that symphonic world. And I’ve been lucky to be able to keep both going.”

In the 1990’s he also worked closely with the Almeida Festival in London, conducting, most notably, the world premiere of Thomas Adès’ chamber opera, Powder Her Face. Almeida, he says, was his “most formative laboratory environment as a young conductor. And I’m as committed to contemporary repertoire as I was then. I’ve conducted a lot of the work of [English composer] Jonathan Dove, for instance, including the Australian premiere of his opera Flight in Adelaide.”

Does he love opera? “I absolutely adore it”, he exclaims. “Not the ‘top-end-of-town’ glamour and emotion, but the unique power of stories told by the singing voice, the most intimate kind of communication, but at scale in a synthesis of all the arts. That’s what makes me an advocate for opera; it’s often mis-sold as a glamorous experience but its core and power are in the intimacy of the singing voice.”  

Last year New Zealand audiences enjoyed Cohen’s conducting in NZ Opera’s acclaimed production of Verdi’s Macbeth. He particularly loves 19th century Italian and French opera. “The agility and variety of Rossini and Bellini are unequalled, and I love the lightness, humour and subtle sexiness of French opera.”

As Cohen moves into his new office, NZ Opera is on tour, presenting Mozart’s Cosi Fan Tutte, directed by Australian Lindy Hume, with dates in Wellington and Christchurch to come.  “I can’t wait to see it,” he says. “Lindy and I worked together for many years, and I’m delighted her production sees me in. Cosi is a game of chess, about moving pieces in a space and observing the experiment. It has beautiful arias and ensembles, but no gorgeous romance. It’s much more fascinating - what happens when affection changes its object?”

Is he hoping to expand NZ Opera’s current - and sometimes lamented - practice of only one mainstage opera production each year? “The board and I want to increase that. We must be fiscally responsible while offering a diverse range of experiences, but it would be great to reverse the worldwide trend towards shrinking numbers of performances and productions.” 

And yes, the challenges are mostly financial. His ambitions for the company are ticked off on the fingers of one hand. “Presenting opera to the nation, connecting the industry and ecosystem efficiently and collaboratively, connecting with the community, including education outreach, sustaining our future – can opera in New Zealand be sustainable? -  and honouring our past by documenting our history.”

“I’m a child of missionaries,” he concludes, “and my evangelising drive is to share the power of music.  Its most powerful touchstones are emotion, communication and community. They’re really the sources of my energy.”  

NZ Opera COSÌ FAN TUTTE by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Lorenzo da Ponte Natalie Murray Beale (conductor), Lindy Hume (director) Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch May 31 to 2 July, 2023

This artist profile was first published in the NZ Listener issue 17 June, 2023