Nicola Creed | Photo: Stephen Wright

A glorious afternoon in the Chiltern Hills. Nicola Creed selects a spot for our conversation in the garden area alongside Garsington Opera’s award-winning pavilion, home to each summer’s performances. Below us, the fabulous Buckinghamshire countryside that enfolds the Getty family’s Wormsley estate, which welcomes opera-goers year on year. On the hillside a mile away, the new £14.5m Garsington Studios. The top-quality facility combines immaculate rehearsal, recording, catering and office spaces. 

So why, with this ambitious opera company on the up and up, has Creed chosen this moment to leave after more than a quarter of a century, first as associate director and, latterly, executive director? It’s the right time for Garsington Opera, she says, with the Studios fully functional, a settled and dedicated line-up of senior staff in place, and the summer opera season in a rude state of health, not least thanks to its association with two world-class orchestras, the Philharmonia and The English Concert. 

But what of personal reasons for stepping down? There’s been no dimming of the pleasure and passion engendered by the job, says Creed. It’s a case of her being aware of how advancing years can easily prejudice a readiness to explore new avenues. ‘One thing that’s made me think has been the deaths of a couple of long-term friends. Somehow, that turn of events makes you feel you should seize the moment to change course while you still have energy… and not just plough on for ever with what you’re doing. Deep down I knew this was the right moment.’ Creed’s new direction involves exploring opportunities offered by her role as a Deputy Lieutenant for Oxfordshire, assisting in the duties to the community required of the Lord Lieutenant, the King’s representative in the county. Her brief will be to promote the arts, in whatever dimension. 

Creed’s impressive achievements at Garsington Opera have been built on the skills acquired in her earlier, multi-faceted, career path. Immersion in the rich musical life of Cambridge University as an undergraduate was followed shortly after by the hectic experience of handling the fine detail of a string of festivals for the Harold Holt artist management company. ‘This involved everything from talking with sponsors and booking performers to checking that music stands were in place or a piano tuner was arriving. You’d be entertaining musicians after evening performances, then getting up at crack of dawn to check out the next concert.’ 

'It’s absolutely addictive…the feeling that you’re giving people wonderful memories, unforgettable experiences.'

Creed moved on to the National Trust, managing its public face in the south of the UK, including setting up musical events at historic properties. ‘On the one hand we staged orchestral concerts for huge audiences in Petworth Park, but there were also things like raising awareness of conservation issues. I remember the celebrity naturalist David Bellamy wearing an extraordinary hat featuring a representation of the threatened Adonis Blue butterfly, which received terrific picture coverage in the press.’ 

All this while Creed and her husband (choral conductor, Neville Creed) were raising four children. The family’s move to her birthplace, Oxford, saw Creed working part-time for the Historic Houses Association, largely handling press and PR. ‘I was really happy doing that…then got a phone call from a friend, Susan Hamilton.’ Hamilton had worked previously at Garsington Opera, which took its name from the village near Oxford where lived the company’s founder, Leonard Ingrams, at historic Garsington Manor. The property’s dazzling garden hosted the operas. ‘Susan said Leonard was needing an administrator and suggested we offer to share the job, part-time. He bought the idea, but I wasn’t sure about going back into the stress of running events when I had four children to look after…Leonard kind of persuaded me.’ 

‘Garsington Manor was/is the most charming place and despite the location’s drawbacks there was never the thought of moving away. So many memories come to mind, including a good few crises…like the time a certain soprano realised very late on a performance day that she’d misread her schedule; then her understudy became completely stuck in traffic. Remarkably, Susan Bickley saved the day by singing two roles!’ 

With everything in the garden looking lovely, Leonard Ingrams died suddenly in July 2005. In 2008, his wife Rosalind gave two years’ notice that performances at Garsington Manor must end. The company’s board of directors was split on whether a final curtain should descend, Creed recalls. ‘I firmly believed we should continue. I ran all the budgets and knew how well things were going. Membership was growing. Ticket sales always over 90%.’ 

That view held sway. Many locations for a new home were considered, Wormsley a late contender. ‘It’s difficult to imagine it now,’ says Creed, ‘but we saw lots of problems here, including the question of how you got an audience in and out of the estate, with its security issues and narow entrance road. In fact, we almost signed an agreement with another location. When that fell through, we returned to Wormsley where the current owner, Mark Getty, was looking for something of quality to add to the estate’s portfolio. We were warmly welcomed.’  

And so an initial fifteen-year agreement was signed. The move from Garsington Manor in 2011 cost around £3.5m, raised by a small fund-raising committee. Much of the money went towards the stunning pavilion, designed by Robin Snell Associates. Whose heart doesn’t beat faster each summer on seeing the curving line of hospitality marquees leading uphill to this magically majestic structure? 

Garsington Opera on the Wormsley Estate | Photo: Stephen Wright

Performance standards have scaled ever new heights, featuring a mix of emerging talents and established names. ‘Our great strength is the quality of ensemble, rooted in vocal compatibility and a unified dramatic vision,’ Creed observes. For which, huge credit goes to the company’s livewire artistic director, Douglas Boyd, who shares the helm with Creed. They were jointly appointed in 2013, the latter stepping up to the position of executive director, thanks to the persuasion of the remarkable Anthony Whitworth-Jones, the company’s irrepressible general director across the period of the Wormsley re-location. ‘Dougie and I have enjoyed a really happy, extremely productive relationship,’ says Creed. ‘We’ve been able to speak our minds to one another, but always reaching agreement and evolving things together.’ 

It wasn’t long before the Garsington team, with senior staff like the long-serving Angus Boyd-Heron central figures, addressed the fragmented nature both of the company’s rehearsal arrangements and its much-praised work with the local community. Finding rehearsal and storage space was a continual headache. And so the idea of Garsington Studios was born, initially with the intention of providing two rehearsal rooms capable of containing complete production sets. Soon, though, it became a project to house the vast majority of the company’s accommodation requirements. Costly, though.  

‘One thing we did was bring potential donors to Wormsley, which in itself is so impressive,’ Creed remembers. ‘It was then a matter of identifying which of the various functions of the new Studios they might like to support, including the year-round community programme.’ And despite the distractions of Covid, that £14.5m target was reached. 

Clearly, Garsington Opera’s community and education work, now with a home base at the Studios, carries as much meaning for Creed as the opera seasons. ‘Music and the arts generally should be available to everyone, not least as a contribution to social cohesion. It’s marvellous that we cater for people across an incredibly wide age-range. Whatever your background, music casts its spell.’ 

Difficult for Creed to contemplate this final summer overseeing a Garsington opera season? ‘Of course I shall miss this. It’s absolutely addictive…the feeling that you’re giving people wonderful memories, unforgettable experiences. This year, there’s someone coming to celebrate turning 80, having previously marked his 60th and 70th birthdays with us. How wonderful is that?’ 

Garsington Opera is running until 22 July. garsingtonopera.org