Danish Opera Artistic Director Resigns Due to Musician Cuts

Artistic Director of the Royal Opera in Copenhagen, Sven Müller, has resigned due to impending musician contract cuts.

Read the report here (in Danish).

Sven Müller was born in 1964 in Hamburg. He has studied musicology at the University of Hamburg, has graduated in opera production at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg and has also studied piano and violin.

From 1992-2000 he worked as a freelance director and assistant director with responsibility for the staging of revival productions for Marco Arturo Marelli, August Everding and Michael Haensel at e.g. Opéra Royal de Wallonie, Liège, Hamburgische Staatsoper, Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona, the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden in London, Opéra de Toulon, the Finnish National Opera in Helsinki, the Bulgarian National Opera in Sofia and the Ukrainian National Opera in Kiev. During this period, Sven Müller staged six of his own opera productions, including Albert Herring at the Hamburg State Opera, Zar und Zimmermann at Theater Zwickau and Boulevard Solitude at Musikhochschule Hamburg.

From 2000-2003, Sven Müller was Artistic Administrator at the opera in Graz and served from 2004-2006 as Director of Opera. At the opera in Graz he improved the level of the permanent soloist ensemble and founded an opera academy for young singers and organized the concert series for Graz Philharmonic Orchestra. He was also a main driving force behind the hosting of a wide range of opera introductions and audience debates.

From 2007-2008, Sven Müller served as Deputy Artistic Director of the Portuguese National Opera Sao Carlos in Lisbon, where he, among other things, organized the concert series of the Orquestra Sinfonica Portuguesa.

Since 2008, he has served as Deputy Artistic Director at the Royal Danish Opera, where his main tasks have been to cast the theater's soloists, enhance the quality of performing guest singers and conductors, as well as organize the Royal Danish Orchestra's concert series. Since February 2012, he has served as Acting Artistic Director of the Royal Danish Opera.

Sven Müller has received several grants and awards. Besides speaking his native German, he also speaks English, Bulgarian, Italian, and is currently also learning Danish, French and Portuguese.