Paul Goodwin is one of Britain’s, most versatile conductors. This breadth of musical interest is evident in his conducting career over the last decade, which spans Monteverdi and Maxwell Davies. Goodwin divides his time between opera productions and concert performances, working with both early instruments and modern orchestras.

Paul Goodwin began his musical career as an oboist, with an interest in contemporary music, before turning to period instruments, in which field he was recognised as one of the leading Baroque oboists of his generation.

He was appointed Associate Conductor of the Academy of Ancient Music (AAM) in 1996 by its founder, Christopher Hogwood. He has been a driving force in the orchestra’s policy of commissioning works, conducting premieres of John Tavener’s Eternity’s Sunrise in 1998 and Total Eclipse in 2000. Tours followed of David Bedford’s Like a Strand of Scarlet in 2001 and John Woolrich’s Arcangelo in 2003, written to mark Corelli’s 350th anniversary, and Goodwin conducted the premiere of the AAM’s latest commission, by Thea Musgrave, in May 2006.

Paul Goodwin first came to public attention as a conductor through his partnership with the producer Jonathan Miller in their staged version of Bach’s St Matthew Passion. Regular opera productions have followed including his highly acclaimed Marriage of Figaro and Il Re Pastore for Opera North, Handel’s Amadigi with the AAM at the Paris Opéra Comique, Handel’s Poro and Gluck’s Orfeo at the Opernhaus Halle, Monteverdi’s L’Incoronazione di Poppea in Athens, Mozart’s La Finta Giardiniera at the National Theater in Mannheim and Handel’s Orlando at Flanders Opera in Antwerp and Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte in Essen. Recently he conducted The Marriage of Figaro at the Liceu Barcelona, followed by Idomeneo in Graz and Haydn’s Orfeo with the Spanish National Orchestra.

In addition to opera, Goodwin’s special interest in voices has led to successful projects with the AAM Chorus and the Choir of New College, Oxford; and in recital programmes with soloists such as Lynne Dawson and Emma Kirkby. In 1999 Paul Goodwin made his BBC Proms debut conducting the AAM, returning in 2001 and 2004 with a programme of Bach, Biber and Muffat. In 2000 Goodwin conducted the AAM as the resident Baroque orchestra in the Belgian Queen Elisabeth International Music Competition for singers, where he and the orchestra returned for the finals in May 2004. Recently he conducted an all-Beethoven programme with the soprano, Joan Rodgers and the AAM and a Tavener dance project with the Southbank Sinfonia, The SWR Kaiserslautern Orchestra, the City of London Sinfonia, Baselkammerorchester, Minnesota and BBC Philharmonic Orchestras.

Paul Goodwin and the AAM record for Harmonia Mundi USA which has so far led to recordings of Christmas music by Schütz and his contemporaries, Mozart’s singspiel Zaïde and two recordings of music by John Tavener: Eternity’s Sunrise and Total Eclipse. Other recent CD releases include Tavener’s Ikon of Eros with the Minnesota Orchestra, and a recording of Christmas Music from Praetorius to Britten with the SWR Kaiserslautern Orchestra which will be followed by discs of Richard Strauss and, Stravinsky and Hartmann.

With the ECO Goodwin has conducted performances with Kiri Te Kanawa, Joshua Bell and Mstislav Rostropovich and has recorded music by Amy Beach and Elgar. He is a regular guest conductor in Europe and the USA, working with orchestras such as the City of Birmingham Orchestra, Orchestre National de Lille, Orchestre National de Belgique, Ulster Orchestra, Halle Orchestra Minnesota Orchestra and with the Swedish, Danish, Netherlands, Zurich, Prague and St Paul’s chamber orchestras. In recent seasons Paul Goodwin’s conducting engagements included the Pacific Symphony Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra Washington, Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra, and Münchner Rundfunkorchester and Komische Oper Berlin.

Paul Goodwin is dedicated to educational projects and as such is Director of the Baroque Orchestra and Early Opera courses at Dartington International Summer School, England. He has also worked with the Dutch and Spanish national youth orchestras, the European Union Baroque Orchestra, and a number of conservatoire orchestras in France, the Netherlands and the UK.