Brian Irvine
Co-Founder / Artistic Director
“Some of the most exhilarating and imaginative music you’ll ever hope to hear……musical play in the highest sense: exuberant, spontaneous, and irresistibly alive.” Washington Post
Born in Belfast, Brian’s unique musical world combines the known and the unknown, the free and the fixed, the schooled and the unschooled. He is driven by a single desire to connect, disrupt, reinvent, and reimagine all aspects of life, people, society, art and understanding in any and as many ways possible. His music is a highly personal concoction of punk, improvisation and contemporary classical.
Shortlisted for an Ivor Novello Award, nominated for five British Composer Awards (BASCA’s) and winner of two, Brian’s huge output includes operas, large scale oratorios, orchestral, ensemble, chamber, solo and dance works as well as film scores and installations.
Often combining and layering diverse and opposing elements he is as happy working with community choirs, gardeners, footballers, bankers, teens, and skateboarders as he is with orchestras and opera singers.
His music has been commissioned, broadcast, and performed all over the world by a vast array of performers and organisations including the London Symphony Orchestra, Welsh National Opera, RTE National Symphony Orchestra, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Red Note Ensemble, Ulster Orchestra, Joanna MacGregor, Fidelio Trio, and Irish National Opera…to name but a few.
John McIlduff
Co-Founder / Artistic Director
“NEST is innovative, moving, surprising, stirring… In fact it is epic (and I don’t use this word lightly), in both scale and inspiration.” Opera Magazine
John is a librettist, writer, stage director, producer, and filmmaker, whose work spans opera, television, film, theatre, music videos, commercials, installations and even the odd song lyric.
A graduate of L’École de Theatre Jacques Lecoq in Paris, an Edinburgh Fringe First Winner, and a Total Theatre Innovation Award nominee, John is interested in exploring how arts practice can intersect, combine, evolve, and democratise.
Most recently his work has combined traditional analogue performance with digital technologies to transform how opera is presented and experienced – taking the art form out of the opera house and onto the streets and attracting new (and younger) audiences. His work has been seen throughout Europe, Americas, and Asia on the streets, in theatres, at film festivals, in concert halls, on TV, in galleries, in communities and on the sides of shipping containers.
Rhian Cooper
Rhian is a Northern-Irish based creative producer and singer-songwriter known for her clarity of vision, artistic sensitivity, and rigorous execution. She currently works as Producer and Marketing Officer at Dumbworld, leading complex, multi-partner projects including international tours and the NI Film Scoring School. Her experience with Dumbworld and previously, Moving On Music spans logistics, funding, stakeholder relations, and creative team coordination.
As an artist, Rhian is an emotionally attuned songwriter, working across contemporary art music and folk-influenced songwriting. Her debut EP Welcome Here (2023), supported by Help Musicians NI and Magy’s Farm, marked the start of an ambitious creative journey. Her current work, funded by Arts Council NI, blends narrative songwriting with sonic experimentation.
Rhian is recognised for her collaborative ethos, organisational excellence, and commitment to building a thriving, inclusive arts sector across Ireland.
Max Beer
Fundraiser
After graduating in Business Studies in Aberdeen, Max Beer studied at Bristol’s Fool Time Centre for Circus Skills & Performing Arts. After some years spent as a street performer and circus tutor, Max consolidated his skills in arts and business gaining a PgDip with distinction in Arts Management from Northumbria University.
He arrived in Northern Ireland in 1997 to coordinate an EU Peace II funded cross border, cross community arts project for Strabane Lifford Development Commission working with Scottish Opera and Ulster Orchestra among others.
Joining Derry’s Playhouse in 2000, Max raised some £15m for both the capital redevelopment of The Playhouse’s buildings and for its ongoing core and programming costs. He was appointed Interim CEO of The Playhouse from 2018-2020 working with the Board to repair the organisation’s financial and operational resilience.
Max joined Dumbworld in 2021. He is also an associate fundraiser for The Fundraisers and the Treasurer of In Your Space Circus.