Paul McCreesh is the founder and Artistic Director of the Gabrieli Consort & Players which he established in 1982 and with whom he has toured world-wide and made many award-winning recordings. Between 2013 and 2016 he was Principal Conductor and Artistic Adviser of the Gulbenkian Orchestra (Lisbon) with whom he conducted a wide range of music from the classical period through to the nineteenth and twentieth century, focusing in particular on symphonic repertoire, oratorio and opera in concert, working closely with the world-renowned Gulbenkian Choir.

McCreesh is well-known for the energy and passion that he brings to his music-making, and has guest conducted many of the major orchestras and choirs across the globe, including most recently the Leipzig Gewandhaus, Berlin Konzerthaus Orchester, Bergen Philharmonic, Hong Kong Philharmonic and Sydney Symphony orchestras. Highlights of his 2014/15 season include his debut in Japan conducting the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra, and returns to the Verbier Festival Orchestra and St Paul Chamber Orchestra, with whom he enjoys a regular and ongoing collaboration.

McCreesh has established a strong reputation in the opera house and has conducted productions at the Teatro Real Madrid, Royal Danish Opera, Vlaamse Opera and at the Verbier Festival. In 2014/15 he will conduct Hérold’s Le Pré aux Clercs at Opera Comique, Paris, and he will return to Vlaamse Opera for a new production of Le nozze di Figaro.

In 2011 McCreesh launched his own record label, Winged Lion, in collaboration with the Gabrieli Consort & Players, Signum Classics and the Wratislavia Cantans Festival, where he was Artistic Director between 2006 and 2012. To date they have made six recordings, three of which have received major awards: Britten War Requiem (BBC Music Magazine Award 2014), Mendelssohn Elijah (Diapason d’Or Award 2013), Berlioz’s gargantuan Grande Messe des Morts (BBC Award 2012), two acclaimed choral albums of Renaissance and contemporary music, and a reworking of his earlier Gabrieli disc, A New Venetian Coronation 1595 (Gramophone Award 2013). The Winged Lion recordings build on his large catalogue of recordings with Deutsche Grammophon, which includes the Gramophone Award-winning Haydn Creation.

McCreesh is especially passionate about working with young musicians and broadening access to classical music; he works regularly with youth orchestras and choirs and is active in building new educational initiatives whenever possible.