PROFILE
Valdemar Villadsen is a Danish stage director working across opera, theatre and music theatre.
Villadsen’s roots are in the theatre: before establishing his international career as an operatic tenor, he worked professionally as an actor, assistant director and director. He continues to combine his international singing career with his work as a stage director and is now expanding his directing activity, bringing together an early grounding in practical theatre-making with more than two decades of experience on the operatic stage.
Sir David McVicar has been a longstanding mentor to Villadsen in stage directing.
Villadsen's directing work includes Bellini’s Il pirata for Open Air Opera Berlin, Puccini’s La bohème and Brecht/Weill’s Die Dreigroschenoper for Bornholms Musikforening, Kurt Weill Factory at the Hamburger Kammeroper, and Pop Up’era – À la Cravate, a site-specific opera production conceived and directed for Open Air Opera Berlin. His earlier work includes Kurt Weill Cabaret at the Royal Danish Academy of Music, subsequently presented at Copenhagen’s Betty Nansen Theatre, and a workshop production of Shakespeare’s Hamlet at Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre in London.
“Valdemar is intelligent, perceptive and imaginative, with strong theatrical instincts and a genuine curiosity about character, human behaviour and dramatic situation, and about what makes a piece come alive on stage.”
SIR DAVID McVICAR
Opera and Theatre Director · Metropolitan Opera, Vienna State Opera, Royal Opera House, Paris Opera, La Scala
Villadsen's stage directing mentor.
“An artistic leader who has vision, reliability and an exceptional talent for communication. Valdemar combines creativity with discipline and professionalism — a rare and highly valuable combination.”
MATTHEW TOOGOOD
Australian Conductor · Erste Kapellmeister, Tiroler Landestheater Innsbruck
Nationaltheater Mannheim · Komische Oper Berlin
Conductor on productions directed by Villadsen.
“Valdemar is an exceptionally gifted theatre-maker with a distinctive artistic voice.”
LINE KROGH
Stage Director · Royal Danish Theatre · Aarhus Theatre · Danish Broadcasting Corporation (DR)
Villadsen worked as her assistant director on two productions.
ON DIRECTING
"For me, directing begins with the whole. Music, drama, space, movement, character and visual language must belong to the same theatrical necessity.
I am drawn to theatre that takes the work seriously without treating it reverentially: theatre in which characters behave as human beings, and in which a strong visual world serves rather than replaces storytelling. I believe theatre can allow us to experience life more intensely and more fully.
I am always searching for theatrical magic: those rare moments of absolute presence when something passes between people on stage — and between stage and audience — that is real, immediate and impossible to fake.
My experience as an opera singer has given me an intimate understanding of what performers need in order to take risks on stage. But my starting point as a director is the work as a whole: the world it creates, the human relationships within it, and what makes it necessary in the theatre — and in the world — today."
Valdemar Villadsen
SELECTED DIRECTING WORK
IL PIRATA
Vincenzo Bellini
Open Air Opera Berlin
Stage Direction & Set Design
LA BOHÈME
Giacomo Puccini
Bornholms Musikforening
Stage Direction
DIE DREIGROSCHENOPER
Bertolt Brecht / Kurt Weill
Bornholms Musikforening
Stage Direction
KURT WEILL FACTORY
Kurt Weill
Hamburger Kammeroper
Concept, Dramaturgy & Stage Direction
KURT WEILL FACTORY II
Kurt Weill
InnovationArt Theatre Berlin
Concept, Dramaturgy & Stage Direction
POP UP’ERA — À LA CRAVATE
Open Air Opera Berlin
Concept, Dramaturgy & Stage Direction
KURT WEILL CABARET
Kurt Weill
Royal Danish Academy of Music / Betty Nansen Theatre
Concept, Dramaturgy & Stage Direction
HAMLET
William Shakespeare
Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre, London
Stage Direction · Workshop Production
FROM THE OPERA STAGE
Alongside his work as a stage director, Villadsen has an international career as a tenor, with engagements at Staatsoper Berlin, the Royal Danish Opera, La Monnaie, Hessisches Staatstheater Wiesbaden, Theater Kiel, Styriarte Festival, Rossini Festival, Copenhagen Opera Festival, and Internationale Maifestspiele Wiesbaden. He has worked with directors including Sir David McVicar, Lucinda Childs, Elisabeth Linton, Marie-Eve Signeyrole, Kay Link, Ebbe Knudsen, Thomas Höft, Francisco Negrin, Sandra Pocceschi, Vasily Barkhatov and Academy Award-nominated film director Virgil Widrich.
His experience as an operatic tenor adds an intimate understanding of the performer’s perspective and of the practical realities of bringing dramatic intention to life on stage.
Valdemar Villadsen
Stage director & operatic tenor