Equally at home in the worlds of opera, symphonic repertoire, and contemporary music, American conductor Ryan McAdams has established a strong presence on both sides of the Atlantic. He continues as Principal Conductor of Crash Ensemble, Ireland's foremost contemporary music group.
Ryan begins the 2025–26 season with Welsh National Opera’s production of Candide, before heading to Atlanta Opera for Philip Glass’s La Belle et la Bête. He will end the year with Irish National Opera, conducting the Ulster Orchestra in their Opera Gala concert in Derry. The new year sees his return to the National Symphony Orchestra in Dublin, the Istanbul State Symphony Orchestra, and his debut with the Stuttgarter Philharmoniker. Throughout the season, he will lead subscription concerts with multiple Italian orchestras, including a tour with Milan's I Pomeriggi Musicali and pianist Mikhail Pletnev.
Highlights of last season included a return to Irish National Opera for Béatrice et Bénédict, featuring Paula Murrihy and actress Fiona Shaw; subscription weeks with the Orchestra of Arena di Verona, Istanbul State Symphony Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland, and Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana in Palermo; and a special concert with the singers of the National Opera Studio and Welsh National Opera. Last summer, he returned to the Ludwigsburger Schlossfestspiele to open the festival with a concert featuring violist Lawrence Power and Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique. In the U.S., he both conducted and stage-directed Sweeney Todd for HALO Opera in South Carolina and made his debut at Festival Napa Valley, conducting and coaching the Manetti Shrem Opera Fellows in a concert with the Festival Orchestra.
In previous seasons, Ryan made his debut at the Opernhaus Zürich in a revival of Faust and returned to the Belgian National Orchestra, as well as to Italy, where he regularly conducts I Pomeriggi Musicali, Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana, Orchestra della Toscana, Filarmonica del Teatro Comunale di Bologna, and the Orchestra of the Teatro Lirico di Cagliari. He enjoys a close relationship with the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della RAI and toured with them on an all-Beethoven programme around southern Italy. In summer 2022, he joined the newly founded regenerative arts and artist-training company Hogfish, where he conducted Gluck’s L’arbre enchanté.
With Crash Ensemble, he regularly performs at the National Concert Hall’s New Music Dublin Festival and the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival. Following the revival and tour of Donnacha Dennehy and Enda Walsh’s latest opera, The First Child, for Irish National Opera—which was highly successful at the Galway International Arts Festival—Signum recorded the production, and the CD is due to be released later this season. Together, they also premiered the FEDORA Prize-winning The Second Violinist by Dennehy/Walsh, bringing the opera to the Barbican in London and Dutch National Opera in Amsterdam.
Past operatic highlights include Faust - Opernhaus Zürich, Carmen - Opera di Roma, Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Teatro Regio di Torino, Pearl Fishers - Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Teatro Regio di Torino, Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della RAI, Mozart and Salieri - Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della RAI, Candide - Opera National de Lorraine, Owain Wingrave - Opera National de Lorraine, Béatrice et Bénédict - Irish National Opera, The Second Violinist – Irish National Opera, The First Child - Irish National Opera, Il barbiere di Siviglia - Opera Theater of St. Louis, Cosi Fan Tutte – The Julliard Schoole and Opera Saratoga, Tosca - Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Madama Butterfly - Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Le Nozze di Figaro - Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Rigoletto - HALO Opera, Sweeney Todd - HALO Opera, L'Arbre Enchantè - Hogfish Opera, and L'elisir d'amore - Gulfshore Opera.
Past orchestral highlights include performances with Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Borusan Istanbul Philharmonic Orchestra, Teatro Regio di Torino, Lirico Sinfonica Petruzzelli di Bari, Kansas City Symphony, Phoenix Symphony Orchestra, National Symphony in Washington, Vancouver Symphony (D.C.), Santa Fe Symphony, Louisville Orchestra, Louisiana Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Academy of St Martin in the Fields, Orchestre Symphonique et Lyrique de Nancy, Orchestre National d’Île-de-France in Paris, Belgian National Orchestra, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, L'Orchestre de Chambre de Genève, Israel Philharmonic, and the Moscow State Philharmonic.
He was the first-ever recipient of both the Sir Georg Solti Emerging Conductor Award and the Aspen-Glimmerglass Prize for Opera Conducting. He was a Conducting Fellow at Tanglewood, Associate Conductor of the New York City Opera, and an Assistant Conductor at the Aspen Music Festival and the Glimmerglass Festival. The post of Apprentice Conductor at Lorin Maazel’s Castleton Festival was created for him. As a Fulbright Scholar, he served as Apprentice Conductor of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, assisting then-Chief Conductor Alan Gilbert. Ryan studied at the Juilliard School and Indiana University.
August 2025
