Timothy Nelson leads a new generation of young directors. Most recently he was named one of four finalists selected from over 160 for the Opera Europa International Directing Prize. In 2002 he founded American Opera Theater, an ensemble incorporating his interests in movement, music, and design, challenging audiences' ideas about opera as theater. Nelson has become known for innovative productions of traditional repertoire, rarely heard works of both opera and theater, and for the creation of new concept works. He continues to develop approaches to expanding understanding of theater, concert, and ritual, maintaining an active career as director, instructor, and lecturer.
With AOT he has created productions of “Venus and Adonis”, “Dido and Aeneas”, “La Calisto”, “David et Jonathas”, the widely acclaimed circus production of “Acis and Galatea”, and a new staging of Handel's “Messiah”. Most recently Nelson directed “David et Jonathas” at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, a cabaret version of the Peter Brook “Carmen” of which the Baltimore Sun said Nelson “out-Brooked Brook”, and Philip Glass' “Hydrogen Jukebox” at Georegtown University as part of the 2009 presidential inauguration festivities. He served as stage director for “La Didone” with the Washington Early Music Festival, stage director for the Bloomington Early Music Festival's production of “Il Re Pastore”, and guest director for Oberlin College's production of “Les Plaisirs de Versailles”. Nelson has pioneered the creation of new theater works such as “Las Cuerdas del Titiritero” with Fenix de los Ingenos, “Ground” for the Baltimore Theatre Project, and the multimedia “Fleury” for Indiana University. Recently named guest resident director at Georgetown University, next season brings “Songspiel”, an original Kurt Weill offering with soprano Sylvia McNair, Handel's “Jephtha” for the Handel Choir of Baltimore, and John Adam's “The Death of Klinghoffer” at the Park Avenue Armory in New York City. He has been the recipient of grants from Geoffrey C. Hughes Foundation, the Virginia Commission on the Arts, the Spanish Embassy, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
A committed educator, in 2004 he founded Les Enfants Terribles, a biannual summer workshop for select young performers. He leads workshops in opera and acting at Indiana University and at Georgetown University. In 2009 he became the first Artistic Director of the Canadian Operatic Arts Academy at the University of Western Ontario. Besides his work with AOT he has spent one season with the Wolf Trap Opera Company. His work as a director and designer has been praised as at once "progressive" and "knowledgeable" - "propulsive" and "fluid". The New York Times calls his work “the future of opera” while the Baltimore Sun has called his productions “vivid, postmodern” with “striking stage pictures”, saying his work is “fresh, inventive, invigorating”.