David White trained as a conductor and repetiteur at the Royal Academy of Music with Colin Metters (RAM) & David Syrus (Head of Music at the Royal Opera House), Accademia Chigiana, Siena with Franco Ferrara, English National Opera's Repetiteurs course and as Musical Director of the Mayer-Lismann Opera Workshop (where he specialised in Mozart, Wagner and Strauss culminating in their production of Così fan tutte with Frankfurt Opera Orchestra).
David White began his career as Musical Director of New Sadler’s Wells Opera. As a young conductor he was spotted by Cameron Mackintosh, who asked him to be Musical Director of Les Miserables at the beginning of its second year in London, making him the youngest musical director ever in the West End.
Having worked with Cameron for fifteen years and been given the opportunity to open some of the world’s most successful musicals, David White decided to branch out into a freelance career. Since then he has collaborated with companies all over the world from the Göteborg Opera to the National Theatre in London.
Selected works:
- Fiddler on the Roof, Chichester Festival Theatre. New Orchestrations, new dance arrangements and Musical Supervisor.
- Sunset Boulevard (2016) with Glenn Close, English National Opera. Symphonic orchestrations.
- Les Miserables (2016), a new version for Wermland Opera, Karlstad, Sweden. Musical Supervisor and Musical Director, additional orchestration.
- Showboat (2015), Sheffield Theatres and West End. Musical Supervisor and Musical Director, new vocal arrangements.
- I Love Musicals. Scandinavian tour and Nippon Budokan Arena, Tokyo. A series of arena concerts in Sweden, Norway and Finland with the Stockholm Sinfonietta, and in Tokyo with the Tokyo Philharmonic, starring Ramin Karimloo, Peter Joback, Norm Lewis and Sierra Boggess.
David White was made a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music in recognition of his services to musical theatre.