Joshua R. Horowitz is a theatre and opera director originally from Old Bethpage, New York, whose work spans opera houses and theaters across the United States. He has collaborated with leading companies including Houston Grand Opera, Washington National Opera, Cincinnati Opera, Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Seattle Opera, and The Glimmerglass Festival.

Joshua’s work encompasses both new productions and the reimagining and remounting of existing productions, with a particular interest in storytelling that places character, theatricality, and emotional clarity at the center of the operatic experience. His directing work includes productions ranging from the core operatic repertoire to musical theater to contemporary and newly commissioned works. At The Glimmerglass Festival, where he has spent multiple seasons as a director and assistant director, he directed the world premiere of Rumplestiltskin and the Unlovable Children, a new youth opera created for the company.

As an assistant and associate director, Joshua has worked alongside some of today’s leading theatre and opera directors, including Francesca Zambello, Simon Godwin, Phelim McDermott, James Robinson, and Crystal Manich. These collaborations have taken him from large-scale grand opera and musical theatre to intimate, character-driven productions, and have helped shape an approach to directing that combines detailed dramatic work with an understanding of the unique demands of music and the operatic stage.

Beyond the rehearsal room, Joshua’s work has included dramaturgy, surtitles, educational programming, lectures, and audience engagement, reflecting his belief that opera is at its most powerful when audiences are invited into both its music and its storytelling. Whether approaching a familiar classic or a new work, he is drawn to finding the humanity, humor, theatricality, and immediacy that allow a piece to speak directly to a contemporary audience.

Joshua holds an MFA in Directing from Baylor University, an MA in Theater from Miami University of Ohio, and a BA in History from the State University of New York at Geneseo.