Tecwyn Evans

Photo: Kaare Viemose & Den Jyske Opera

After his studies in New Zealand Tecwyn Evans left on a Fulbright Scholarship to study conducting at the University of Kansas with Brian Priestman and Simon Carrington. His career began when Sir Andrew Davis appointed Tecwyn Chorus Master for Glyndebourne Festival Opera in 1999, the following year making his Glyndebourne debut conducting performances of La Boheme on the Glyndebourne Tour. From 2009-2011 Tecwyn held the post of Erste Kapellmeister und Stellvertreter des Chef Dirigenten at Grazer Oper in Graz, Austria. Tecwyn was Director of Music /Musik Chef at Danish National Opera / Den Jyske Opera June 2018-June 2020

Tecwyn has conducted Don Giovanni (English Touring Opera), Die Fledermaus (ETO), Fidelio, La Boheme, Pelleas et Melisande (Opera Theatre Company), The Rake’s Progress (Royal Northern College of Music), Eugene Onegin (Royal Northern College of Music/Danish National Opera), Hansel and Gretel (Opera New Zealand), Rotter (Oper Köln), Carmen (Gothenburg Opera/University of Otago), Madama Butterfly (Grazer Oper/Danish National Opera/University of Otago), Aida (Lyric Opera Productions/Exeter Festival), La Rondine, L’elisir d’amore, Falstaff (Opera North), Die Meistersinger, Le Nozze di Figaro, Die Csardasfürstin, Don Giovanni, Faust, The Queen of Spades (Grazer Oper), Maria Stuarda, Simon Boccanegra (Chelsea Opera Group), La Traviata (Grazer Oper/Danish National Opera) as well as working on the music staff at Glyndebourne, Opera North, and National Opera de Paris.

His appearance in the final of the 2005 Leeds’ Conducting Competition led to his debut with the BBC Philharmonic and at the BBC Promenade Concerts at the Royal Albert with the same orchestra. His German operatic debut came in 2008 stepping in at two week’s notice to conduct Torsten Rasch’s opera Rotter at Oper Köln.

Other highlights of his career so far have been a CD of music by NZ composer Anthony Ritchie with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, conducting the world premiere of Ross Harris’s Violin Concerto no. 1 with British Violinist Anthony Marwood and the same orchestra, and recording a CD with Bryn Terfel and the orchestra of Welsh National Opera for Deutsche Grammophon. He has also  appeared in concert with Bryn and the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra and with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales.  In July 2013 Tecwyn conducted three world premieres of John Tavener with the BBC Philharmonic at the Manchester International Festival.  2014 saw premieres of Anthony Ritchie’s Violin Concerto with Southern Sinfonia and Bella Hristova and the opera This Other Eden by Anthony Ritchie and Michelanne Forster at Arts Festival Dunedin.

Tecwyn has shared the concert platform with many high profile soloists including Steven Isserlis, Rebecca Evans, Jonathan Lemalu, Martin Roscoe, Anthony Marwood, So Ock Kim, Nicola Benedetti, Jennifer Pike, Marlis Petersen, Bryn Terfel, James Rutherford, Dame Malvina Major, Susanna Andersson, Nicolas Altstaedt, Peter Auty, and Elin Manahan Thomas. 

Across ten countries Tecwyn has conducted the BBC Philharmonic, the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Ulster Orchestra, the Orchestra of Opera North, Helsingborg Symphony Orchestra, Nordic Chamber Orchestra, Stavanger Symphony Orchestra, Grazer Philharmonic Orchestra, Manchester Camerata, Salomon Orchestra, Dunedin Symphony Orchestra, Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra,  Christchurch Symphony Orchestra, Netherlands, Queensland and Adelaide symphony orchestras with repeat invitations to all of these ensembles. He continues to enjoy success with youth orchestras and young players with multiple projects for NYOS, RNCM the NZSO NYO and more recently the symphony orchestra at The Royal Conservatoire Scotland. Tecwyn’s experience over all these ensembles reveals his interest and skill in delivering a wide range of repertoire from Bach to recent composers such as Sir John Tavener and James MacMillan.

In 2015 Tecwyn returned to the  BBC Philharmonic recording a concert of NZ and Australian music for the 2015 Anzac Day commemorations and worked with Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg recording the orchestral tracks as part of John Psathas’ ‘No Man’s Land’ project.  Other recent highlights include BBC New generation artist recordings with BBC NOW and soloists Pavel Kolesnikov and Narek Hakhnazaryan, Messiah with Huddersfield Choral and the Royal Northern Sinfonia, Messiah in Edinburgh, his Norwegian debut with the Stavanger Symphony and performances of Gershwin’s Crazy for you with Gothenburg Opera. Early in 2016 Tecwyn made his debut with the BBC Singers and has fulfilled several return invitations since.