John Berry (arts administrator)


John Edward Berry CBE is a British-born musician and arts administrator.

Biography

Berry graduated from the Royal Northern College of Music in 1983, and subsequently studied with Gervase de Peyer, supported by a scholarship to the Mannes College of Music in New York City. In 1984, he was diagnosed with Hodgkin's Disease, and returned to the UK for successful treatment at The Christie Hospital in Manchester. He was unable to continue playing the clarinet professionally after his illness, and redirected his career to arts administration.
Berry served as the founding director of the Sounds Alive Music Centres from 1986 to 1993. He then founded the Brereton International Music Symposium, and served as its director from 1990 to 1997. Other work has included employment as an artist manager at Harrison Parrott, a consultant to The Hallé Orchestra from 1998 to 2002, and as an advisor to several USA opera companies, such as Santa Fe Opera. He was an artistic and broadcasting Consultant for several video productions of operas, including:
In 1995, Berry joined English National Opera as casting director, and served in the post from 1995 to 2003. He instigated the first 'Jerwood Young Artists Programme', which later developed into 'The ENO Harewood Artists'. He became Director of Opera Programming in 2003, and subsequently named ENO's artistic director in November 2005. The last appointment was controversial, as it occurred without either due process or interview. As ENO's artistic director, he brought in artists from outside the opera world into ENO productions, including film directors, theatre directors, visual artists and choreographers. His co-producing policy extended ENO's reach to more than 40 opera houses around the world, the most prominent being the relationship with the Metropolitan Opera House, New York.
Berry expressed skepticism about cinema relays of operas in May 2012. In December 2013, in a reversal of those earlier statements, ENO announced a reversal of course and a new relationship with Altive Media to take ENO's productions into cinemas. Other developments at the company included, in 2014, a new relationship with restaurateur Ben Warner and Benugo for the redevelopment of the Coliseum foyer spaces, and a new commercial relationship with Lord Grade and Michael Linnit to produce semi-staged musicals. The last actions were in response to the 29% reduction in Arts Council England funding.
Awards won during Berry's tenure include:
In February 2015, ACE placed ENO under special measures. This had followed public revelations of disputes between the outgoing chairman of ENO, Martyn Rose, and Berry, with uncorroborated accusations by Rose that Berry had mismanaged finances and lost £10M, and the departure of Henriette Götz as executive director in January 2015. ENO countered Rose's accusation by stating that during Berry's tenure, ENO "turned over an unrestricted surplus of £2.4M." In July 2015, following the widely acclaimed 2014-2015 season at ENO, Berry stood down as ENO artistic director with immediate effect, stating "My work is now done".

Other work

In July 2016 Berry was appointed creative advisor to the Bolshoi Theatre. In October 2017, he negotiated a co-production agreement between the Bolshoi and Metropolitan Opera NY for three operas, Lohengrin, Aida and Salome, all featuring Anna Netrebko. Berry was adviser to the Vienna Staatsoper from July 2018 to August 2019.
Berry founded the charity Opera Ventures in March 2017, to produce opera and mixed media performances. In August 2017, Opera Ventures premiered its first new production, Greek, by Mark Anthony-Turnage CBE, co-produced with Scottish Opera and in collaboration with the Edinburgh International Festival. Its second production was Breaking the Waves by Missy Mazzoli, co-produced with Scottish Opera, Houston Grand Opera and Théâtre de l'Opéra Comique in association with Bristol Old Vic. It premiered at the King's Theater in Edinburgh on 21 August 2019 with performances until 24 August. It opened at the Adelaide Festival in March 2020 to critical acclaim. Performances in collaboration with BAM NYC and The Metropolitan Orchestra conducted by their Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin, due to take place in July 2020, were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
In November 2018 he officially launched a commercial theatre production company, Scenario 2, together with co-director Anthony Lilley OBE. Its first production is The light in the Piazza by Adam Guettel featuring Renée Fleming and Dove Cameron, premiered at the Southbank Centre's Royal Festival Hall in London on 14 June 2019 with performances until 6 July 2019. The show then moved on to the USA, where its opening night took place on 12 October in LA in collaboration with Los Angeles Opera at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. It then moved to Chicago from the 14th to 20th December 2019 with outstanding reviews. In August 2020 it will premiere in Australia, where it will be presented at the Opera House in Sydney from the 14th to the 22nd August. Scenario Two is also preparing a new staged musical production about the life of the late Italian Tenor Luciano Pavarotti.

Personal life

Berry is married to the mezzo-soprano Pippa Dames-Longworth. He was made a CBE in the Queens Birthday Honours in 2014, for Services to Music.