J. David Jackson

During the 2023-24 season, I have gained critical acclaim leading the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra in performances of Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice staring Anthony Roth Costanzo. This season I return to the Met to conduct Mozart’s The Magic Flute. I made my conducting debut at the Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie in Brussels with Don Pasquale, and have since won acclaim in Europe, Asia and America. My Metropolitan Opera conducting debut was with the Richard Jones production of Hansel and Gretel. Other conducting credits at the Met include Porgy and Bess with Eric Owens and Angel Blue, Simon Boccanegra with Placido Domingo, and The Queen of Spades.
Recent credits have included the debut with the Hong Kong Philharmonic and my Carnegie Hall debut with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra Chamber Players, the Teatro Massimo Bellini in Catania, Sicily, Janáček’s From The House of the Dead and Messiah with the Gulbenkian Orchestra in Lisbon, The Turn of the Screw for the Trentino Music Festival, The Golden Cockerel with Novaya Opera (New York), Tosca at El Paso Opera, and a gala concert at the Smetana Festival in Litomyšl, Czech Republic, featuring soprano Debbie Voigt.
Past seasons have seen my debut with Canadian Opera Company, Genoa’s Teatro Carlo Felice, Glyndebourne Festival, Istanbul State Opera and Ballet. I have also conducted with Kentucky Opera, Opera Omaha, Central City Opera Festival, Wolf Trap Festival, Palm Beach Opera, the Théâtre de la Place in Liège, Belgium and the Slovenian National Orchestra.
At the Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie, I have conducted Così fan Tutte, Die Zauberflöte and The Love for Three Oranges on highly successful tours throughout Belgium and Germany.

As Music Director of the Intermezzo Opera Festival, I led the highly acclaimed European premiere of Mark Adamo’s Little Women, the Trentino Festival, Siena Summer Festival and conducted for the Manhattan School in New York.



I have an enormous operatic repertory including everything from early Baroque to contemporary. I am noted for my interpretation of French and Russian opera, with acclaimed successes.

My performances of Tchaikovsky’s The Queen of Spades at the Met and War and Peace in Toronto were also critically praised. Since 1996, my new conclusion to Mussorgsky’s Khovanshchina is regularly performed in Brussels and elsewhere.


My commitment to contemporary opera is reflected in my successes as Music Director for American Opera Projects

My near-half century of friendship with recently deceased American composing legend Lewis Spratlan has borne fruit in several productions. I have led premiere performances of Act One of Spratlan’s Midi, a reinterpretation of the Medea legend set in the 1930’s Caribbean, while my performances of Act 2 of Spratlan’s Life is a Dreamgarnered the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 2000. I also have been selected to serve as editor of a highly anticipated new book on Spratlan’s music.

I’m also very active as a composer. My compositions have been heard in Europe and the United States.

I was trained as a pianist and violinist before beginning my conducting career. I have attended Amherst College and the Peabody Conservatory, studying with Otto Werner Mueller, Franco Ferrara, and Sixten Ehrling. In addition to my native English, I speak Italian, French, Spanish, German and Russian, I’m conversant in Czech.


Standard Opera Repertory

Mozart

La Finta Semplice, La Finta Giardiniera, Thamos, Zaide, Idomeneo, Die Entführung aus dem
Serail, Der Schauspieldirektor, Le Nozze di Figaro (also in German), Così fan Tutte (also in German ), Don Giovanni (also in German), Der Stein der Weisen, La Clemenza di Tito, Die Zauberflöte (also in English, French, Flemish); variousmasses, Requiem

Italian

Bellini - I Capuleti e i Montecchi, La Sonnambula, Norma, I Puritani
Boito – Mefistofele
Busoni – Turandot
Cavalli – La Calisto
Donizetti – Anna Bolena, L’Elisir d’Amore, Lucia di Lammermoor, The Daughter of the Regiment (Ital/French), Don Pasquale
Giordani – Andrea Chénier, Fedora
Handel - Rodelinda, Giulio Cesare; Messiah
Leoncavallo – I Pagliacci
Mascagni – L’Amico Fritz, Iris, Cavalleria Rusticana
Monteverdi – L’Incoronazione di Poppea, Orfeo
Ponchielli – La Gioconda
Puccini – Manon Lescaut, La Bohème, Tosca, Madama Butterfly, La fanciulla del West, La rondine, Il Trittico, Turandot; Messa di Gloria
Rossini – L’Italiana in Algeri, Il Turco in Italia, Il Barbiere di Siviglia, La Cenerentola, La Gazza Ladra, Armida, Ermione, Guillaume Tell; Petite Messe Solennelle
Salieri – Prima la musica, poi le parole
Verdi – Aida, Ballo in Maschera, Don Carlo (also French), Falstaff, Macbeth, Nabucco, Otello, Rigoletto, Simon Boccanegra, Traviata, Trovatore; Requiem
Zandonai – Francesca da Rimini

French

Berlioz - Béatrice et Bénédict, Benvenuto Cellini, La Damnation de Faust, Roméo et Juliette, L’Enfance du Christ
Bizet - Carmen, Les Pêcheurs de Perles
Debussy - Pelléas et Mélisende
Gluck - Orphée et Eurydice (also Ital)
Gounod – Faust (also Ger), Roméo et Juliette
Massenet - Cendrillon, Don Quichotte, Le Jongleur de Notre Dame, Manon, Thaïs, Werther
Offenbach – Les Contes d’Hoffmann (also Ger), Orfée aux Enfers (also Ger)
Ravel - L’Enfant et les Sortilèges
Saint-Saëns - Samson et Dalila
German

Beethoven - Fidelio; all standard masses/oratorios
Berg - Wozzeck
Hindemith - Mathis der Maler, Hin und Zurück
Humperdinck - Hänsel und Gretel (also Eng)
Lehar – The Merry Widow
Schönberg - Erwartung
J. Strauss Jr. – Die Fledermaus (also Eng)
R. Strauss – Arabella, Ariadne auf Naxos, Die Frau ohne Schatten, Elektra,
Der Rosenkavalier, Salome
Ullmann – Der Kaiser von Atlantis
Wagner – Der Fliegende Holländer, Lohengrin, Parsifal, Tristan und Isolde,
Das Rheingold, Die Walküre, Siegfried, Die Götterdämmerung
Weber - Euryanthe, Der Freischütz, Oberon

English

Adamo - Little Women
Britten - Peter Grimes (also Ger), Albert Herring, Turn of the Screw,
A Midsummer Night’s Dream (also Ger), Saint Nicolas
Floyd - Susannah, Slow Dusk
Gershwin - Porgy and Bess
Handel - Messiah
Heggie – Dead Man Walking
Menotti - Amahl and the Night Visitors
Moore - Ballad of Baby Doe
Purcell - Dido and Aeneas (also Ger)
L. Spratlan - Life is a Dream, Earthrise, Midi
Stravinsky - Rake’s Progress (also Ger)
Vaughan-Williams - Riders to the Sea

Russian

Borodin - Prince Igor
Dargomizhsky – The Stone Guest, Rusalka
Glinka - A Life for the Tsar/Ivan Susanin, Ruslan and Lyudmila
Mussorgsky - Boris Godunov, Khovanshchina, The Marriage
Prokofiev - The Gambler, Love for Three Oranges, Betrothal in a Monastery, War and Peace
The Fiery Angel
Rimsky-Korsakov – The Maid of Pskov, The Tsar’s Bride, The Tale of Tsar Saltan, Mozart and
Salieri, Kaschei the Immortal, The Tale of the Golden Cockerel
Shostakovich - Lady Macbeth of Mtsenk, The Nose
Stravinsky - Renard, Le Rossignol, Mavra
Tchaikovsky - Eugene Onegin, Pique Dame, Iolanta, Maid of Orleans
Verstovsky - Askold’s Tomb

Czech

Dvořák - Rusalka
Filas - Jane Eyre
Janáček - Cunning Little Vixen, Jenufa, Katya Kabanova, From the House of the Dead
Smetana - Bartered Bride (also German)

Other

Bartok - Bluebeard’s Castle
De Falla – Atlántida, La Vida Breve
Stravinsky - Oedipus Rex


SELECTED REVIEWS:

Metropolitan Opera Chamber Players, Carnegie Hall

His was a "driving performance…with a nice swagger,” “wit and charm,” and “exuberant energy.”

Jackson led with “spirit and energy... wonderful color and style….It was sheer joy to hear the ensemble playing…with such savoir faire.” - George Grella, for www.newyorkclassicalreview.com


Messiah with Teatro Massimo Bellini

“…the heavens opened up, and we heard nothing short of the voice of God.” – La Sicilia


Simon Boccanegra, Metropolitan Opera

“[At the fourth performance -] led with authority and sweep not precluding fine detail by J. David Jackson – everyone’s performance seemed more cohered.” - David Shengold, for Opera News


Pique Dame, Metropolitan Opera

“J. David Jackson, who first mounted the Met’s podium successfully at the helm of last season’s final Hansel and Gretel, led Tchaikovsky’s challenging, multi-element score with impressive command, tightening the pace in places.” - David Shengold, for Opera News



Le Jongleur de Notre Dame , Central City Opera Festival

“…a triumph...stunningly realized by conductor J. David Jackson...the unquestioned highlight [of the season]” - Kyle MacMillan, for the Denver Post

“Conductor J. David Jackson provided firm architectural support, minimizing sentimentality but finding the score’s beauties.” - David Shengold, for Opera News

“...a truly inspirational performance...under the leadership of J. David Jackson.”
- Maria Nockin, for Opera Japonica

“ Maestro J. David Jackson contributed highly polished musical ensemble and taut dramatic pacing throughout, ...at the final curtain the audience was so emotionally affected by the opera and the performance that it would be some moments before they could wipe away their tears and applaud the performers.” - John Koopman, for L’Opéra



Euryanthe, Glyndebourne Festival

“At the last performance...the American [J.] David Jackson made his Glyndebourne debut. ...in comparison to the...more rational [Mark] Elder,...Jackson created a performance that was warmer, more tender, and filled with inner life. The conductor’s love for this sublime music was felt in every measure, and the surging quality forged by the maestro in the overture imparted a special attraction to the entire evening. Jackson’s strengths were further revealed in his sensitive rapport with the singer.”
- Andrei Hripin, for Kultura (Moscow) and www.opera-news.ru


Life is a Dream (Lewis Spratlan), concert performances of Act II. This work was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Music for 2000.

“J. David Jackson conducted...a performance that was articulate, committed, and convincing.” - Richard Dyer, for the Boston Globe

“...a first-rate conductor...” - The Boston Globe


L’Italiana in Algeri, Wolftrap Festival

“...the orchestra was spirited, and J. David Jackson conducted with a propulsive sweep.”
- The Baltimore Sun

Der Schauspieldirektor/Prima la musica, poi le parole, Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie

“ Under J. David Jackson’s direction the playing was fresh and alert. Both Mozart’s ingenuity and charm and Salieri’s musical humor and precision came into their own.”
- De Standaard, Brussels

“J. David Jackson...seduces with his lively tempos, with the formal balance of his architectural vision, and with his capacity to recreate elegantly and gracefully the lyric essence of each work.” - La Libre Belgique


J. David Jackson’s conclusion to Mussorgky’s Khovanshchina,
Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie

“probably closest to Mussorgsky’s original intentions” - The Times (London)

“ The innovation of a finale, especially commissioned from the American composer
J. David Jackson, [was] a total success.” – L’Opéra