Divall conducted many concerts, ballets and 151 operas, particularly works of the late baroque, Mozart, Handel, Gounod, Berlioz and Verdi. These included the complete operas of Claudio Monteverdi, Berlioz's Les Troyens and Richard Strauss' Elektra. He conducted Verdi's Don Carlos, the first opera to be staged in the State Theatre of the Victorian Arts Centre in 1984. His repertoire included Lohengrin and Tannhäuser by Wagner. The most recent operas he directed were Donizetti's Maria Stuarda, Hasse's Antonio e Cleopatra, Bizet's Les pêcheurs de perles, and Puccini's final opera Turandot at Monash University.
Academic career
Divall was a Vice-Chancellor's Professorial Fellow at Monash University and an Honorary Principal Fellow in Music at the University of Melbourne, and the University of Malta. As a musicologist he edited over 150 works of early Maltese composers especially from the period of the knights, including the complete sacred music and operas by Nicolas Isouard. He was editing the sacred music and operas of Girolamo Abos. Four volumes in his editions of 24 works of Michel' Angelo Vella have been published by Lyrebird Press . Divall was associated with several residential colleges of the University of Melbourne, first Queen's College and later Newman College. In 2014, he was appointed an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Divinity, Melbourne, and in September 2014 a Visiting Professor of Music at King's College, London. For 45 years, Divall pioneered the study of, edited and published many volumes of early Australian music. He was the Chairman of the Marshall-Hall Trust, and was completing an edition of the complete works of the English baroque composer Michael Christian Festing, and the Complete Sacred Music of Girolamo Abos. Divall worked in several fields at Monash, was a member of the committee for the construction of the new Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music, as well as assisting the staff and students at that school. In 2015 he was the co-producer of the ANZAC Commemorative CD Gallipoli – A Tribute, which was sponsored by the Ian Potter Foundation and Monash University.
Edited works by Gluck, Rameau, George Frideric Handel, Wesley, Bellini, Verdi, the Complete Sacred Music of Nicolo Isouard, and the Complete Works of Michael Christian Festing.
Elizabeth I – Nance Grant, Mary Stuart – June Bronhill, Earl of Leicester – David Parker, Lord Talbot – John Bolton-Wood, Lord Cecil – Barry Clark, Ann Kennedy – Janet Dawson, Victorian State Opera, Victorian State Opera Orchestra and Chorus. Melbourne 24 July 1976 Conductor::Richard Divall
Leanne Kennealy – Julian Gavin; Conducted by Richard Divall – Sydney 1999
DVD
Alcina – George Frideric Handel
Joan Sutherland – Sally-Anne Russell – Wendy Dixon – Elizabeth Campbell – Glen Winslade – Stephen Bennett; Conducted by Richard Divall. Australian Opera, Australian Opera Chorus. Sydney 1987
Honours
Divall was awarded honorary degrees from Monash and Australian Catholic University and a PhD in Theology by the University of Divinity in church history and 18th century Maltese sacred music. He was an Officer of the Order of Australia, an Officer of the Order of the British Empire and was awarded a Spanish knighthood in 2008. He was a Fellow of Queen's College, and was on the SCR of Newman College at the University of Melbourne. He was a Knight of Malta in solemn religious profession and was active in hospitaller and charitable works in that order.
