Although working in all theatrical forms, musical, revue and cabaret for example, Dutch born director Marcel Sijm concentrates mostly on opera and contemporary music. He specialises in creating new works together with composers. World premiers include the opera Jimmy by Edward Top and Snow White by Micha Hamel for the Reisopera Netherlands. Marcel Sijm had his directorial debut with The Dutch National Opera Amsterdam, with the opera Legende by Peter-Jan Wagemans, followed by Kopernikus by Claude

Vivier. Sijm has enjoyed, throughout his career, conceiving musical stage works for youth, both from blank assignments as well as adaptations from repertoire opera. Sijm has special strength in reworking older comic operas into modern works, thematically and in musical structure and in language. For the Dutch National Opera he made adaptations of Il Viaggio a Reims and A little Dog’s Heart, an adaptation from Bulgakov’s novel. Alongside these unusual and exciting productions, Marcel Sijm has directed several biographical dramas, including works devoted to the lives and works of Dutch artists such as Johnny and Jones, Simon Carmiggelt, and Johnny Jordaan, as well as Jacques Brel, Judy Garland and Thelonious Monk; the last being a puppeteering musical-theatre work. Marcel Sijm was the Artistic Director of the Poortersfestival: a festival promoting contemporary composers and artistic director of Orkest MaxTak which promotes performances for children as well as live-performances of music for films. In the classical opera repertoire he directed amongst others Offenbach, Berlioz, Verdi, Bizet, Janacek, Stravinsky, Menotti and Judith Weir. His next opera will be the world premiere of Ritratto by Willem Jeths for the Dutch Nationale Opera in 2020.