After leading Vancouver Opera for 17 years James Wright retired from the company in June 2016.
He currently sits on the Nature Conservancy of Canada BC board of directors and The TELUS Vancouver Community Board; he has just completed a two-year term on the Vancity Community Foundation board of directors and is a volunteer with the 27th International Ornithological Congress being held in Vancouver in 2018

With Vancouver Opera he inaugurated the company's award-winning community engagement programs in 2002 that took deep dives into issues related to opera, with special attention to the Japanese Canadian internment in WW II, the integration of contemporary First Nations ethos and art into classic European 18th Century opera, and most recently bullying, making connections with people of all ages and backgrounds, using the power of art to help build communities. VO’s 2010 production of Nixon in China has been seen in San Francisco, Stockholm, Dublin and Kansas City. James served 12 years on the Opera America board of directors and as chair of the Opera.ca board of directors, and was a member of the Imagine Canada board of directors. He has been a panelist for the Canada Council, the British Columbia Arts Council, The Vancouver Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
He received the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal in 2012 for service to peers, community, and to Canada.

Before moving to Vancouver, Wright was the general director of Opera Carolina and served in senior positions at Anchorage Opera and Lyric Opera of Kansas City.