He was born in Oxford on 10/09/1947. He is a distinguished director of rarely performed operas and new productions of classic works. He was educated at educated at St John's College, Cambridge. His first major work came in 1972 with his production of "Káťa Kabanová" for the Wexford Festiva. He was the Director of Productions at Scottish Opera (1975-80), where in cooperation with the Welsh National Opera he directed cycle of operas by Leoš Janáček. He was Director of Productions at English National Opera, where he directed over twenty operas (1982-93). During the period 1993-2004 he worked with major opera houses, such as: Zurich Opera, Vienna State Opera, Bavarian State Opera (Munich), Leeds Opera , De Nederlandse Opera (Amsterdam), Opera Australia. He also worked also with major opera houses in America, Japan and the United Kingdom. He was the Intendant of the lakeside Bregenz Festival (2003-14). From 2011 he is the Executive and Artistic Director of the Welsh National Opera. He has worked as a librettist for Sir Peter Maxwell Davies and Elena Langer. He was honored with the "Janasek Medal" for his cycle presentation of the composer's works in Wales and Scotland and with the "Martinu" prize for the production of Bohuslav Martinů works Julietta and The Greek Passions [Řecké pašije] (United Kingdom, Bregenz Festival). He won numerous awards, among them, the "Lawrence Olivier" award twice. He has been honored internationally with the titles Commander of the Order of the British Empire and Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres (France). He has directed over ten world premieres of new operas. GNO presented a revival of his direction of the opera The cunning little vixen [Příhody lišky Bystroušky] (2014-154)