About Anthony Addison
Anthony Addison, Resident conductor of Heights Chamber Orchestra and Music Director Emeritus of Columbia Civic Orchestra, returned in 2002 to the Cleveland area, where from 1964 to 1981 he headed The Opera Theater program of The Cleveland Institute of Music, conducted the University Circle Youth Orchestra, gave performances for children at CIM and in inner city schools, reviewed the Metropolitan Opera on WCLV, and started Opera al Fresco, with Cleveland Opera Theater Ensemble, later known as Cleveland Lyric Opera.
He has been a professional musician since the age of seven, when he became a chorister at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, singing at the coronation of George VI. After studying viola and conducting at the Royal Academy of Music and freelancing in both disciplines, he joined the Carl Rosa Opera Company as coach, chorus master, and later as conductor. He was Music Director of the London University Orchestra and conducted for Ballet Rambert in England, and the Edinburgh International Festival Ballet in Europe. In Rome’s Teatro Eliseo he conducted Mozart operas, and in London started the University College Opera, which opened its fiftieth season in 2000.
He moved to the United States at the invitation of Boris Goldovsky, firstly to study in Tanglewood and then to assist in the musical and dramatic side of the Goldovsky Opera Institute in New York. He toured with the Goldovsky company and taught at many of the Institute’s workshops and, for five years, headed the Interlochen Summer Opera Theater. He also directed for Lake Erie Opera Theater, with the Cleveland Orchestra, and/or conducted for a number of smaller opera companies. The repertory of operas which he has either staged or conducted includes such unusual works as "Benvenuto Cellini" and "Beatrice and Benedick" by Berlioz, "Lodoiska" by Cherubini, "Arlecchino" by Busoni, "Escorial" by Levy and "La clemenza di Tito" by Mozart, as well as five operas by Britten, seven by Puccini, and four by Verdi.
From The Cleveland Institute of Music, Mr. Addison went to the University of Texas in Austin, to Rice University in Houston, and to North Texas State University in Denton. In retirement, he started the Columbia (MO) Civic Orchestra and led a group of musicians in visits to approximately a hundred and twenty Elementary School classrooms. In Cleveland, he guest conducted a concert with Heights Chamber Orchestra and was appointed its Resident Conductor in 2007.
He is a prolific orchestrator and arranger; his orchestration of Elgar’s Organ Sonata will receive its European premiere in Erlangen in January 2008. He has produced English versions of many operas, and edited the four volumes of Boris Goldovsky’s The Adult Mozart. He is author of Staging the Music, a guide for Opera Directors and Singers, published by the National Opera Association.
Since 2004 he has been artist-in-residence with the music department at Brush High School in the South Euclid-Lyndhurst school system, conducting the Chamber Orchestra, for which he has produced a number of musical arrangements.
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