Luka Venter is a multidisciplinary musician and writer from Te Whanganui-a-Tara. With a diverse practice spanning contemporary music to collaborations with period ensembles, their practice as both a composer and conductor has a particular emphasis on opera. Recently Luka joined the Royal Opera House as the assistant and cover conductor for the UK première of George Benjamin’s Picture a day like this, assisting Corinna Niemeyer and working closely with the composer, librettist Martin Crimp, and the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House. Recent compositions have included song premières at St Martin-in-the-Fields, and Lanternfish, a chamber opera commissioned by the Guildhall School as part of the Opera Makers programme, in association with the Royal Opera House, and premièred at the Barbican Centre. puāwai, a new work for taonga pūoro and viola will be given its international première in Brazil in July by Ariana Tikao and Sophia Acheson. Luka is a graduate of the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and Te Kōkī, the New Zealand School of Music. A previous winner and finalist of the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra Todd award, Luka was the recipient of the 2022 Edwin Carr Foundation Scholarship and is a 2023/24 Britten Pears Young Artist, and a Conducting Fellow with the NZSO, Te Tira Pūoro o Aotearoa.
