Dr Michael Downes OBE

Director of Music at the University of St Andrews, and founding artistic director of Byre Opera. He has lectured for the UK’s leading opera companies and writes notes for Wigmore Hall and Aldeburgh Music. Publications include books written both with and about British composer Jonathan Harvey, and a collaboration with Nike Wagner, great-granddaughter of Richard. Story of the Century, his new book on Wagner’s Ring, was published in 2024 by Faber. It was named by Presto Music as one of the five best music books of that year and described by Gramophone magazine as ‘the best introduction to The Ring out there’; it was published in the US in 2025 by Pegasus as Wagner and the Creation of The Ring, and an Italian translation is forthcoming. Michael’s next book will be a biography of Elgar, to be published by Oxford University Press.