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Richard James Bradshaw, O.Ont was a British opera conductor and the General Director of the Canadian Opera Company in Toronto.
Born in Rugby, Warwickshire, England, Bradshaw received an honours Bachelor of Arts degree in English from University of London in 1965. From 1975 to 1977, he was the Chorus Director at the Glyndebourne Festival Opera. From 1977 to 1989, he was Resident Conductor at San Francisco Opera.
In 1988, he was a guest conductor of the COC. In 1989, he was appointed Chief Conductor and Head of Music. In 1994, he was appointed Artistic Director and General Director in 1998. At the COC, he had conducted more than 60 operas.
In 2004, he was made a member of the Order of Ontario for having "brought the COC international acclaim, including a first-ever invitation to the Edinburgh Festival, garnering two prestigious awards".
In 2006, he received the Governor General's Performing Arts Award. It was also that year that saw the opening of the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, a 30-year dream that came to fruition for the Canadian Opera Company and for Bradshaw himself. In September of that year, Bradshaw and the COC opened the season with three complete performances of Wagner's Ring, thus becoming the first conductor since Wagner himself to inaugurate an opera house with a complete Ring.
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