MSO Education Conductor
MSO EDUCATION CONDUCTOR
Award-winning conductor Benjamin Northey is one of Australia's brightest and most versatile conductors. He appears frequently with the Australian state symphony orchestras and is currently Principal Conductor of the Melbourne Chamber Orchestra. In addition to his extensive symphonic repertoire, Northey's professional experience spans opera, ballet and contemporary music. Winner of the 2001 Symphony Australia Young Conductor of the Year Competition Northey studied under John Hopkins, and Jorma Panula and Leif Segerstam at the Sibelius Academy and Stockholm Royal Academy of Music.
In 2007/8 Northey was selected from an international field to the prestigious International Conductor's Acadmey of the Allianz Cultural Foundation. This elite program involved a year-long mentorship with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and the Philharmonia Orchestra and conductors Christoph von Dohnanyi and Vladimir Jorowsky, culminating in a critically acclaimed performance of Stravinsky's Symphonic in C in June 2008 at London's Royal Festival Hall.
Northey has participated in international conducting masterclasses with the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Moscow Symphony Orchestra and in Israel with the Haifa Symphony Orchestra. In 2006 he conducted the Futurum Ensemble Sinfonietta in a concert of music by Salvatore Sciarrino for the Stockholm New Music Festival and toured Sweden with the Sodra Halsinglands Orkesterforenings. He has assisted Leif Segerstam in Latvia with the Leipaja Symphony Orchestra and in Austria with the Graz Symphony Orchestra. In 2005 Northey conducted the Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg in a concert for Mercedes Benz Austria.
Northey enjoys a close relationship with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra after making his professional debut with the Orchestra in 2003, conducting Beethoven's Symphony No 6. His most recent performance with the MSO was in 2008 conducting Mozart's Symphony No 41 (Jupiter) and Requiem. From 2009 he takes on a new role as Conductor of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra Education Program.
Northey debuted with the State Opera of South Australia in 2007 with Donizetti's L'elisir d'amore and returns in 2009 to conduct Offenbach's The Tales of Hoffmann. In 2008 he conducted Offenbach's Orpheus in the Underworld and Peter Maxwell Davies Eight Songs for a Mad King for Monash University. In 2008 he made his ballet debut with The Queensland Ballet, conducting Mendelssohn's A Midsummer Night's Dream.
Northey was a recipient of the 2003 Brian Stacey Memorial Trust Award under patron Sir Charles Mackerras for emerging Australian conductors and also the 2001 Nelly Apt Scholarship for studies in Israel. In 2007 he was awarded Limelight Magazine's award for Best Newcomer in any field of classical music and in 2008 won Limelight's Best Classical Recording award, for Slava and Leonard Grigoryan's CD Baroque Guitar Concerti with the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra (ABC Classics).
