Olivier Award for ETO

Tuesday 15 April 2014

RCM friends and partners English Touring Opera (ETO) have won the 2014 Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement in Opera.

The Olivier Award – the first one the ETO has ever received – was presented at a ceremony at the Royal Opera House on Sunday 13 April. The award was given for ETO’s ‘brave and challenging’ Spring productions of two operas by RCM alumni: Michael Tippett’s King Priam and Benjamin Britten’s Paul Bunyan.

ETO Music Director and RCM Director of Opera Michael Rosewell (pictured, left) was at the ceremony with General Director of ETO James Conway (right). On accepting the award, James Conway said: “It’s a great honour for English Touring Opera’s work to be recognised by SOLT nominators and judges … to be noticed in London’s exciting theatre world is almost more than one could have hoped for.”

The RCM collaborates regularly with the ETO, notably on an acclaimed 2012 production of Monteverdi’s The Coronation of Poppea, directed by James Conway and featuring singers from the RCM International Opera School. Most recently, ETO selected the RCM’s Britten Theatre for eight performances of their national tour of Baroque Opera from Venice in October 2013, in which many RCM singers and alumni also starred.

Established in 1976 and organised by Society of London Theatre (SOLT), the Laurence Olivier Awards celebrate the world-class status of London’s theatre and are recognised internationally as British theatre’s highest honour.