William Kelley [b.1992] maintains a multifaceted career as a conductor, pianist, arranger, and coach for opera, musical theater, and concert work. Recent conducting credits include the 2026 Young Patrons Gala at the Dutch National Opera & Ballet, Le Nozze di Figaro at The Juilliard School, Mitridate, CosΓ­ fan tutte, Opera Meets Broadway, and Carmen at Staatsoper Hamburg; Salome, Orpheus in der Unterwelt, Doctor Atomic, Macbeth, Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Angels in America, Hello, Dolly!, Jenufa, Pagliacci, and The Cunning Little Vixen, at Theater Bremen, where he held the position of 1. Kapellmeister until 2024. He has appeared recently in recital with tenor, Levy Sekgapane at the Blaricum Music Festival [NL] and the Tivoli-Gardens Festival [DK]. Kelley is also a member of the music staff at the Dutch National Opera where he works regularly with young singers and pianists at the Dutch National Opera Studio. This season he conducted a collaboration of the Royal Concertgebouw Academy and DNOS in the Grote Zaal at Het Concertgebouw and Opera Studio Goes Broadway, a Sondheim revue with stage director Pim Veulings in Studio Boekman at the Dutch National Opera & Ballet.


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A young man standing on stage in front of an orchestra, smiling and shaking hands with an older man. The scene is in a theater with musicians seated with music stands around them.
A man conducts an orchestra, gesturing with both hands, while music musicians look on.

Previously, Kelley held the position of Kapellmeister at Luzerner Theater in Luzern, Switzerland. He made his European conducting debut in 2017 with the Luzerner Sinfonieorchester and Mozart's Die ZauberflΓΆte with following productions including the Swiss premiere of Abraham’s MΓ€rchen im Grand Hotel, Mozart's Don Giovanni, Carmen.maquia (version for ballet), Piazzolla’s MarΓ­a de Buenos Aires, a world premiere in the Lucerne Festival: Im Amt fΓΌr Todesangelegenheiten (2018) with the 21st Century Orchestra, and the 2019 GΓΌbelin Luzerner Sinfonieball.  

 As a guest conductor, Kelley has appeared with the Prague Radio Symphony and Het Balletorkest; assisted Nicholas KrΓΌger at Opera Zuid in Les enfants terrible, Christopher Franklin with the Czech Philharmonic, and Yoel Gamzou in Seven Deaths of Maria Callas with Marina AbramoviΔ‡ at Teatro San Carlo. As a pianist and vocal coach, Kelley worked for institutions such as the Salzburg Festival, the Dutch National Opera, The Lindemann Young Artist Program at The Metropolitan Opera, The Juilliard School, the Czech Philharmonic, and the Luzerner Sinfonieorchester, and with conductors such as James Gaffigan, Edward Gardiner, Fabio Luisi, Yannick NΓ©zet-SΓ©guin, and Lorenzo Viotti and directors such as Barrie Kosky and Peter Sellars. Since 2020, he has enjoyed a close collaboration with English composer Iain Bell and gave the world premiere of his melodrama for tenor and piano, Comfort Starving with tenor, Petr Nekoranec and a staged version of the piece later that summer at the Bach Festival Swidnica with director, Krystian Lada. His collaboration with Bell and Lada continued in 2021 with a staged performance of the partner-work to Comfort Starving, The Man With Night Sweats with bass, Alex Rosen at the Opera Rara festival in Krakow, Poland. 

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Previous performance highlights include recitals with tenor, Petr Nekoranec at Staatsoper Stuttgart and the Janacek Festival in Ostrava, Czech Republic, Schubert’s Winterreise with baritone, Christopher Herbert on Trinity Wall Street’s Twelfth Night Festival and the Harvard Club, a residency with the New York Festival of Song (NYFOS) at the Caramoor Festival and his Lincoln Center debut with a recital in Alice Tully Hall alongside baritone, Theo Hoffman, which included the New York premiere of Jonathan Dove’s song set, Three Tennyson Songs [2011].

Kelley is a graduate of The Juilliard School and The University of North Carolina Greensboro and is based in Amsterdam, Netherlands.