Murray Hipkin studied at York University, the Guildhall and the National Opera Studio before joining English National Opera (1983–1988 and 1995-present). There he has conducted The Pirates of Penzance, The Mikado, The Gondoliers, Kismet, Carousel, Chess and Man of La Mancha, and was associate conductor of The Duchess of Malfi (ENO/Punchdrunk). As répétiteur his productions over 36 seasons have included Phyllida Lloyd’s Ring Cycle and Terry Gilliam’s The Damnation of Faust; as assistant conductor, recent projects include Sweeney Todd, The Barber of Seville, Sunset Boulevard, Orpheus and Eurydice, The Yeomen of the Guard, Akhnaten, Iolanthe and The Pirates of Penzance and HMS Pinafore. In 2013 he played the solo piano in the ENO film of Death in Venice and recently played the solo piano in The Turn of the Screw, Albert Herring and The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny and onstage bells in The Magic Flute. In 2022 he appeared as Music Supervisor and coach in the ENO reality series Anyone Can Sing.
Elsewhere he has conducted La bohème (Surrey Opera, Opera Box); Salieri Falstaff, Haydn La vera costanza, Mozart Apollo and Hyacinth, Gluck Le cinesi (Bampton Classical Opera), and worked for Opéra de Lyon, La Monnaie, Opera Factory, Scottish Opera and Opera Brava.
Other highlights include assisting the composer John Adams both for the C4 film The Death of Klinghoffer, and for Nixon in China at the Proms and in Berlin; Pierrot Lunaire with Björk at the Verbier Festival and Sweeney Todd for Bergen National Opera. In February 2009 Murray completed an eight-month sabbatical from ENO as Musical Director of The Sound of Music at the London Palladium.
In 2023 and 2024 he conducted The Pirates of Penzance, The Gondoliers, The Mikado, The Sorcerer and The Yeomen of the Guard at the International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival in Buxton and in spring 2024 he worked on the Deutsche Oper production of Nixon in China.
Murray has been with NLC since January 2003 and from 2010 until 2023 was also MD of the Pink Singers, Europe’s longest-running LGBT+ choir. Plans include Angel’s Bone (ENO/BBC Phil/Aviva). In 2025 Murray joined the Board of Trustees of The Choir With No Name.
Murray Hipkin is a member of English National Opera, and appears by permission.