Biography
The stage director Julia Burbach is collaborating with the National Theatre Opera in the 2023/24 season for the first time, creating a new production of L'elisir d'amore. In 2019, she received the Best Newcomer nomination within the prestigious International Opera Awards. Born in Tokyo to German parents, she grew up in Milan, Prague, Munich, Bonn, London and Hong Kong. She studied at University College London (History, History of Art and International Public Policy). After a stint at the United Nations in Paris, she decided to return to the UK so as to fully focus on directing. From 2015 to 2021, she was resident staff director at the Royal Opera House in London. As an assistant director, she worked on Christof Loy’s Die Bassariden (Bayerische Staatsoper), Lulu (Covent Garden, London), Tristan und Isolde (Covent Garden and Houston Opera) and other productions. The operas Julia Burbach has directed include Eugene Onegin (Theater Lübeck), Der singende Teufel (Theater Bonn), Manon Lescaut (Theater Kiel), Siegfried and Götterdämmerung (Hackney Empire, London), Eugene Onegin and L'amico Fritz (Opera Holland Park), La bohème (Theater Bielefeld), Edmea (Wexford Festival Opera), Semele (Shanghai International Arts Festival), Die Walküre (Opéra National de Bordeaux), Das Rheingold and Die Walküre (Grimeborn Festival, nominations for 2020 and 2021 OFFIE awards), The Rape of Lucretia (Grimeborn Festival, OFFIE 2019), Tosca and Madama Butterfly (Grimeborn Festival), The Fairy Queen (Bury Court Opera and Kiez Oper, Berlin), Il trionfo del tempo (Kiez Oper), and many others.