Benjamin Northey

Benjamin Northey is an Australian conductor, musician and arranger.

He appeared as a soloist with the Australian Wind Orchestra on their tour of Japan and Hong Kong in 1990.

In 1996 Northey commenced performance studies in classical saxophone at the University of Melbourne Conservatorium of Music, graduating in 1999 with First Class Honours.

It was only in the final year of his degree, at age 29, that he turned to conducting.

This occurred under the mentorship of John Hopkins, who encouraged him to be the first candidate for his new Master of Music in Conducting degree at the Victorian College of the Arts and Music.

In 1998 he toured Australia and the United States as keyboardist and saxophonist with guitarist Tommy Emmanuel.

In 2001 he won the Nelly Apt Scholarship for study in Israel.

The same year he won the Symphony Australia Young Conductor of the year competition, marking the first time the two most prestigious Australian conducting prizes had been won by the same person in the same year.

Part of the prize for the latter award was the opportunity to study in Sydney with Jorma Panula, under the aegis of the Symphony Australia Conductor Development Program.

He graduated in 2002.

In 2002 he was the highest placed applicant to the Orchestral Conducting Course at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, Finland.

He studied there for three years under Leif Segerstam and Atso Almila.

In 2002 Ben Northey first displayed his interest in contemporary music by conducting the world premiere of Mark Elliott's Concerto for Chinese Sheng and Orchestra with the University of Melbourne Symphony Orchestra.

From 2002 to 2006, he was Resident Guest Conductor of the Australian Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra (later renamed the Melbourne Chamber Orchestra, of which he was Principal Guest Conductor 2007–10).

His major professional conducting debut came in 2003 with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, in a concert at the Myer Music Bowl that included Beethoven's 6th Symphony.

In 2004 his diploma concert with the Sibelius Academy Symphony Orchestra was awarded the international jury's highest possible mark.

The program included the European premiere of Brett Dean's Amphitheatre.

In 2005 he made his official European conducting debut with the Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg.

He was also a visiting artist at the Australian National Academy of Music and a guest lecturer in conducting at the University of Melbourne.

He completed his tertiary studies in 2006 as a guest student in Jorma Panula's class at Sweden's Royal College of Music, Stockholm.

Since returning to Australia in 2006, Northey has been a regular guest conductor with all the Australian state symphony orchestras.

He has also led opera productions including La Boheme, Turandot, Carmen, L'elisir d'amore, The Tales of Hoffmann, La sonnambula, Sweeney Todd, Orpheus in the Underworld, Don Giovanni and Così fan tutte, for companies such as the State Opera of South Australia, Opera Australia and New Zealand Opera and the ballet A Midsummer Night's Dream for the Queensland Ballet.

In 2006 he worked with Hilltop Hoods and the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra to create an orchestral take on the Hoods' platinum-selling album "The Hard Road Restrung".

This unique collaboration won an ARIA Award.

His orchestral arrangements have been used by Tim Minchin, k.d. lang, The Whitlams and Dan Sultan.

In 2007 he was chosen from a worldwide field as one of three participants in the International Conductor's Academy of the Allianz Cultural Foundation.

This involved a year-long mentorship with the London Philharmonic Orchestra (LPO) and the Philharmonia Orchestra, with conductors Christoph von Dohnányi and Vladimir Jurowski.

This culminated in a performance of Stravinsky's Symphony in C in June 2008 at the Royal Festival Hall in London.

In 2009 Northey was appointed Conductor of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra (MSO)'s Education Program.

He was previously the Associate Conductor of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra from 2010-2019.

Northey was born and raised in Ballarat, Victoria.

His father Robert (Bob) Northey is a retired university administrator and former president of the Ballarat Symphony Orchestra and his mother Wendy is a forensic psychologist and pianist.

His uncle is the retired AFL football player and coach John Northey.

He attended Ballarat Clarendon College where he studied flute, clarinet and saxophone with Barry Currie and arranging with Graeme Vendy, and where his skills as a saxophonist, clarinettist and flautist were first developed; in his early years he also played piano, trumpet and violin.

At 12, he won prizes in Ballarat's Royal South Street Eisteddfod for performances on flute and saxophone.

During his teenage years he began working professionally in local pit orchestras in Ballarat for musical theatre and operetta productions.

After school he moved to Melbourne, where he worked as a freelance musician, composer and arranger for close to ten years.

During this time he was an active recording session musician and also performed with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, the Australian Pops Orchestra and the Australian Showband.

He has been Chief Conductor of the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra in New Zealand since 2015.

He is also the Principal Conductor in Residence of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra since 2020.