Unfriended
The Metropolitan Opera announced today that longtime [almost 40 years!] Artistic Administrator Jonathan Friend will be stepping down from his position following the end of the 2019–20 season.
Breaking
The Assistant General Manager is on the march!
The Metropolitan Opera announced that Diane Zola has been appointed the company’s new Assistant General Manager, Artistic, replacing the late Robert Rattray.
Devil’s candy
The Richard Tucker Music Foundation announced today that Christian Van Horn has been named as the winner of the 2018 Richard Tucker Award.
Frauen sind doch bessere Diplomaten
1940s German musical movie star Marika Rökk was a Russian counterspy!
Cost disease rampant in city!
Intrepid cub reporter Terry Teachout has scored the scoop of the century!
“Das Ende! Das Ende!
“Maestro James Levine, the Met’s Music Director since 1976, announced that after 40 years in the position, he will retire at the end of the current season, for health reasons,” says the Met press office.
Uomo non vidi mai
From the Met: “Jonas Kaufmann has canceled his performances in this season’s new production of Puccini’s Manon Lescaut due to illness.”
Vanishing act
Kasper Holten, Director of Opera at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, has announced he will quit this post in March 2017.
Breaking: horses not to be frightened
“Our patrons are also our investors, and because many of our core subscribers are also our most generous philanthropists, we need to make sure that our programming jives with their expectations, what they’d like to see onstage.”
Here’s Lucy
The breaking news from San Francisco Opera is that Nadine Sierra will sing the title role of in a new production of Lucia di Lammermoor, replacing Diana Damrau, who will not.
“My work is done”
John Berry, artistic director of the English National Opera, has announced he intends to step down from his role after 20 years with the Company.
“Nun halt’ ich, was mich erhebt, der Mächtigen mächtigsten Herrn!”
In an unprecedented move, the Bayreuth Festival has named conductor Christian Thielemann official “Music Director.”
Orange is the new spinto
Opera star Montserrat Caballé has reached a deal with the public prosecutor to receive a six-month prison sentence and a €240,000 fine for defrauding the Spanish tax office.
Leaner in
The Metropolitan Opera just announced that 22 positions from its administrative staff of 254 have been eliminated as part of a company-wide program of cost cutting.
Overtime
UPDATE: The Met has reached tentative agreements with AGMA and Local 802. The contract deadline has been extended through midnight on Tuesday, August 19, to allow Local One and the other remaining unions with unsettled contracts more time to secure new deals with the institution.
Back from the dead?
AGMA and Local 802 have agreed to the Met’s proposal that Allison Beck, a representative of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, be appointed immediately to mediate negotiations, working with both sides to find a compromise agreement.
Anna engaged? No.
According to the Facebook page of tenor Yusif Eyvazov (Des Grieux to Anna Netrebko‘s Manon in the Rome Opera Manon Lescaut), the two are “engaged.”
It’s today!
La Cieca’s spy informs her that the Met will announce its 2014-2015 “Wednesday evening.” Watch parterre.com starting at 4:00 pm tomorrow for up-to-the-minute coverage.
Courage… du courage!
La Cieca hears that soprano Alex Penda is en route to London on a rescue mission, for which her friends (young or otherwise) are doubtless giving thanks.
A song at twilight
Yes, you’ve heard it already, but you might as well have an official place to talk about it: Marina Poplavskaya goes on tonight in Les Vêpres siciliennes at the Royal Opera House.
Something happened up there, something not very nice
Emma Thompson will portray Mrs. Lovett in the New York Philharmonic’s staged production of Stephen Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street.
A multiplicity of mezzos
Wonder no more! Says the Met press office, “Elina Garanca has withdrawn from her 2013-14 Met engagements because she is pregnant with her second child, who is due this winter.”
After the fall
Wendy White is suing the for a 2011 accident on stage during a performance of Faust.
Those “Das-is-ein-fideles-Gefängnis-da-werd-ma-einen-kleinen-Schligowitz-ein-schalten-net” Blues
Broadway actor Danny Burstein will make his Metropolitan Opera debut in the non-singing role of Frosch in this season’s performances of Die Fledermaus.
I’ll take the fall
The days are getting shorter, but you can keep the prattle going this fall’s Talk of the Town! You will, you can, you must join in the discussion about: Great mezzo soprano performances (October),
Gained in translation (November), Teleport me back to… (December).
Win a Free Ticket to Opening Night at the Met!
Quinn Kelsey and Lise Davidsen star in the Met's new Macbeth. We're giving away one ticket, so screw your courage to the sticking place and enter now!
