GRAMMY-nominated Irish conductor Elaine Kelly held the position of Resident Conductor and Chorus Director of Irish National Opera (INO) from 2021-2024. An avid champion of contemporary opera, she has conducted works by Donnacha Dennehy, David Coonan, Amanda Feery, Evangelia Rigaki, Anna Mullarkey and last year conducted the double-bill, operatic world premiere by Emma O’Halloran in the PROTOTYPE Festival in New York and later with LA Opera before a nationwide Irish tour the following year. She conducted nine new works in INO’s internationally praised 20 Shots of Opera in 2020 and a nationwide tour of The Lighthouse (Maxwell Davies) in 2021.
Most recently, Kelly has conducted Dawn to Dusk: The Moon is Listening (Richard Taylor) with Garsington Opera, UK and in November 2023, conducted the world premiere of Akathist (Benedict Sheehan) in Trinity Church Wall Street, New York, recorded for album release in 2024 receiving a GRAMMY nomination.
Equally at home in standard operatic repertoire, Kelly conducted Faust (Gounod) and Così fan tutte (Mozart) with INO and has worked on Elektra, Der Rosenkavalier and Salome (Strauss), Cenerentola and William Tell (Rossini), Die Entführung aus dem Serail (Mozart), La bohème (Puccini), Alice’s Adventures Under Ground (Barry), Fidelio (Beethoven), Carmen (Bizet), L’Elisir d’Amore and Maria Stuarda (Donizetti). Elaine has also worked as assistant conductor with Opera National de Bordeaux (France) and Nouvel Opéra Fribourg (Switzerland).
Kelly has guest appeared with the National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland, RTÉ Concert Orchestra (Ireland), Mozarteumorchester Salzburg (Austria), Ahmed Adnan Saygun Senfoni Orkestrasi (Turkey), Cork Concert Orchestra, Cork Opera House Concert Orchestra and was Music Director of the Dublin Symphony Orchestra and the University of Limerick Orchestra.
In 2014, Kelly won 1st prize in the inaugural ESB Feis Ceoil Orchestral Conducting Competition.