James Henshaw

James Henshaw is an Olivier-nominated opera, choral and orchestral conductor based in Berlin, where he leads a varied life as a coach and freelance conductor. He studied music at Clare College in Cambridge, where he was a choral student as well as award-winning conductor and pianist. He then trained as a repetiteur at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. Henshaw has worked at many of the world's finest opera houses, including Glyndebourne Festival Opera, Bayerische Staatsoper, Hamburgische Staatsoper, English National Opera and L'Opéra de Rouen. He has conducted performances for English National Opera, Scottish Opera, Garsington Festival Opera, English Touring Opera and Longborough Festival Opera.

After graduating with honors from Guildhall, he assisted Mark Wigglesworth at the Aldeburgh Music Festival and at the Proms with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales. That same year he was Chorusmaster for Monteverdi's Orfeo at the Bayerische Staatsoper with Ivor Bolton.

He joined English National Opera in August 2015 and became ENO's youngest ever chorus master in August 2016. During his tenure, the chorus won an Olivier Award for "Outstanding Achievement in Opera" and "Best Chorus" at the International Opera Awards in 2016.

During James' time at ENO, he made his debut at the London Coliseum as second conductor in Birtwistle's Mask of Orpheus, for which he received an Olivier award nomination. He conducted the U.K. premiere of Jonathan Dove's The Day After, named by the Guardian as one of the top 10 best things in classical music in 2017, Britten's Paul Bunyan at Alexandra Palace and was to conduct the final three performances of a new production of The Marriage of Figaro in April 2020, until the series of performances was interrupted by the Covid-19 crisis.

Since the corona pandemic, James has lived in Berlin. He made his German conducting debut at the Hamburg Hochschule with a new piece Penelope, who, a feminist take on the character of Penelope, the wife of Orpheus. He returned to Hamburg in early 2023 to collaborate on a new production of Puccini's Il Trittico.

James conducts his own orchestra, The Outcry Ensemble, based in London. The orchestra performs new music in each of its concerts and has performed works by Kate Whitley, Joel Rust, Laurence Osborn, Josephine Stephenson and Freya Whaley-Cohen. They recently completed a Beethoven Symphony cycle. In 2021, they performed a complete cycle of Beethoven Symphonies to raise money for young freelance musicians. Click here for more information.

James has conducted operas for many professional opera companies in the United Kingdom. In 2015, he made his professional conducting debut with four performances of La Bohème for English Touring Opera. Since then, he has made his debut with Longborough Festival Opera and Garsington Opera with productions of Die Zauberflöte assisting Anthony Negus and Christian Curnyn, respectively, and conducting a performance with both companies. He was also assistant conductor to Stuart Stratford at Scottish Opera with two performances of Johnathan Dove's Flight.

This season James won 1st prize and the Orchestra Prize at the prestigious Kussewitzky International Conducting Competition, resulting in several international debut invitations, including Orchestra sinfonica di Grosseto and Orchestra sinfonica di Sanremo. In March, he also made his debut with the BBC Concert Orchestra and returned to conduct summer opera at his alma mater, the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. Last season he made his debut with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Glyndebourne.