Niels Nuijten studied theatre studies and dramaturgy at the University of Amsterdam, with a minor in musicology. Previous to this he studied jazz saxophone at the Fontys Conservatorium in Tilburg and Spanish language and culture at the University of Barcelona. He has worked at La Monnaie in Brussels, Opera Vlaanderen in Antwerp /Ghent and the Dutch National Opera in Amsterdam. Since the 2020/21 season he has been dramaturg at Theater Basel.
As a freelance dramaturg Niels Nuijten works with various directors. His productions with Lisenka Heijboer include Over Orpheus, Parsifal as part of a ‘Kundry project’ by the Bochum Symphony Orchestra and Vrouwenstemmen, a new opera celebrating a century of voting rights for women by Frank Siera and Meriç Artaç, at the Grachtenfestival in Amsterdam. Their most recent project, Faust [working title], opened the 2020/21 season of the Dutch National Opera. Together with composer and director Michel van der Aa, Niels Nuijten has worked on the mixed reality opera Eight and on Aa’s new film opera Upload. He made his Salzburg Festival debut as dramaturg for Christof Loy’s production of Così fan tutte in 2020. In September 2021 he will return to the Dutch National Opera to work with Barbora Horáková on her staged production of Haydn’s Missa in tempore belli.
In theatre, Niels Nuijten collaborated with Gilles Groot on The Hollow Beyond and Learning What Love Means at Theater Rotterdam. He has a long-standing association with Toneelschuur and Toneelschuur Producties in Haarlem, where he worked as a theatre programmer until recently.
