After a recent flurry of activity about Mieczyslaw Weinberg, I was about to give him a rest when – what do you know? – two world premiere recordings landed on my deck. Both extraordinarily fascinating, one Judeo-Christian, the other Judeo-Polish. Click here for my album of the week on sinfinimusic.
Five days ago, Slippedisc and other media outlets received the following email from a ‘concerned opera lover’ in Australia:
I’m not sure if you’re all aware that Opera Australia has employed the Georgian soprano Tamar Iveri to sing the role of Desdemona in the upcoming production of Otello in spite of the fact that she has publicly declared herself to be a homophobe. Paris Opera cancelled her contract based on the open letter she sent to the President of Georgia
Anonymous emails are not, on the whole, credible sources.
#
The link given in the email was over a year old and the Paris allegation could not be verified. The mailshot looked as if jealous individuals in a notably unhappy opera company were seeking to dislodge an unpopular, highly-paid foreign visitor.
#
Such things cannot be verified swiftly at distance.
#
An Australian website went public with the contents of the email and the resultant public outcry led to Ms Iveri’s dismissal – which had clearly been the intention of the anonymous mailer.
#
In view of the appalling nature of the views expressed on Ms Iveri’s website, that was the correct and inevitable outcome. However, the reasons Ms Iveri was targeted in Australia are neither transparent nor honourable.
#
This was not a principled campaign against prejudice but a petty turf war, fought behind cover of anonymity. Many in the opera world are left feeling squeamish – not by the ultimately justifiable dismissal of Ms Iveri but by the shadowy, xenophobic motives behind it.
#
Several have contacted us today to express unease at the ‘lynching’ of a fellow-artist. Altogether, this has been an unedifying episode in the march to gender parity and equal rights in the arts.
Tamar Iveri, removed from next month’s Otello for her apparently homophobic views, has reverted to Facebook to express her regrets. She maintains that words, published on her Facebook page a year ago about a gay parade in her native Georgia, did not represent her personal views and were, in any event, mistranslated and taken out of context. She insists her husband wrote them.
Here is her statement:
I came to Australia last season and made my debut here in Sydney in Un Ballo in Maschera. It was one of the most lovely experiences in my career. Then and now I came to sing for all the people who would like to hear me, and there is no one whom I would ever wish to exclude. However as much as I was looking forward to singing Desdemona in this season’s new production of Otello.
I have now decided to withdraw from the cast. As difficult as it has been to come to this decision, I do so out out of consideration for the tranquillity of my colleagues and for the success of the production.
By withdrawing , I wish to insure that the performances take place undisturbed by any further controversy.. I do not want such an important artistic event to be marred by any problem which, however unintentionally, has developed because of my presence in the cast.
I also must say that I am immensely saddened and hurt by the campaign which is now being mounted against me. I have never been prejudiced against anyone, whether for religious, or racial reasons, or for any other kind of prejudice including those regarding sexual preference. I abhor prejudice in any form altogether. I have been performing in an art form that includes thousands of gay people on both sides of the stage, and there is no one who can come forward and claim that I have ever exhibited any such prejudice against them.
I have said before and say here again that the words attributed to me were not my own, and that I therefore cannot take personal responsibility for them. I can only repeat again and again that this is my position. I also want to make clear once more that my concerns last year about the Parade for Gay Rights in Tbilisi were not based on any opposition to the rights of gay people everywhere; rather they were founded by my fears that he the parade would arouse a violent reaction from parts of the arch-conservative Georgian religious community. Unfortunately this is exactly what did happen ,as those participating the parade were criminally attacked by such elements.
The award, founded in 2012, honours the executive producer – not the director – of the past year’s best opera production.
This years shortlist consisted of:
John Berry for Wozzeck at English National Opera;
Jurgen Flimm for The Tsar’s Bride, Staatsoper Berlin;
Eva Wagner-Pasquier, Katharina Wagner for Walküre, Bayreuth Festival; and
Gerard Mortier for Purcell’s Indian Queen at the Teatro Royal, Madrid.
‘The International Jury decided to abandon a vote for the shortlisted projects. Instead, the prize was awarded to Gerard Mortier for his enormous contribution to the arts and for his outstanding role in the development of musical theatre. The prize money will fund the Russian publication of his book, Dramaturgie einer Leidenschaft,’ a manifesto-cum-memoir.
Mortier died in March, aged 70.
He’s being sued by the orchestra president for saying, two years ago, that ‘a bunch of crooks dressed in $3,000 suits came in who didn’t know a thing about the music business.’
Peter Nero, 80, music director emeritus of the Philly Pops, now says he didn’t really mean that.
Frank Giordano, the orchestra president, last week launched a $75,000 defamation suit against him. A statement from Nero’s lawyer’s office said: ‘I recognize that I perhaps should have been more careful. I apologize for that conversation and some of the statements I made. I did not mean to cause harm nor offend.’
Course he didn’t.
What’s impressive is a conductor who can tell a $3,000 suit from a $300 one.
The following messages appeared this morning on Ayatollah Khamenei’s twitter feed.
Like all celebrity tweets, they were almost certainly not by the man himself. Nor do they constitute a particularly profound contribution on his part to World Music Day.
But they do reflect a fundamentalist mindset that is worth understanding.
Here are the tweets:
You know that I’m anti-western, yet by reasoning I confirm the positive qualities of West; one of which is issue of #music.
*
It’s true that in West there’s decadent #music for dancing & debauchery,but instructive &meaningful music also have long existed there.
*
Apart from decadent #music,there’re some types of music in West that a wise transcendental person can enjoy it in concerts.
*
In West,there’s no shortage of #music that saved a nation or led intellectual groups 2the right path;West had ¤tly has such qualities.
*
Instead of using #music in course of moral decadence,direct it towards noble goals; if so,music can be called holy.
*
What the Ayatollah seems to want is more Beethoven and Verdi, less Bieber and Lady Gaga. Nothing wrong with that.
Hours after the Monnaie theatre in Brussels announced that it was cancelling her contract for next season, Tamar Iveri was ‘released’ from singing Desdemona at Opera Australia in two weeks time. A replacement has yet to be announced.
‘Opera Australia has reached agreement with Ms Iveri to immediately release her from her contract with the company,’ read the Facebook statement. ‘Opera Australia believes the views as stated to be unconscionable.’
Ms Iveri posted an abusive anti-gay statement on her Facebook page a year ago. Today, she added a statement of regret for her dismissal.
Ms Iveri’s career is now in jeopardy. She is represented by Zemsky/Green management, whose roster includes such outstanding sopranos as Anja Harteros, Kristine Opolais, Eva Maria Westbroek and Pretty Yende. Their damage control mechanisms have not functioned well this weekend.
UPDATE: How an opera turf war blew into a world furore. Click here.
David Weiss, principal oboe of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, collapsed and died last month while surfing off the Pacific Palisades. Today, colleagues and friends remembered David on his favourite beach.
Photos by Anahid Papakhian @ Music Academy of the West
Latest campaign poster from the opera musicians.
We have received confirmation from the intendant of la Monnaie that the company will not employ the Georgian soprano who is accused of uttering homophobic insults.
Dear Mr Lebrecht, I can confirm that la Monnaie will not be welcoming Mrs Iveri for the performances of ballo in maschera for which she had been planned in may 2015. I wish to stay loyal to my very intimate conviction that we cannot tolerate intolerance, of whatever kind. I feel this is a very honest reaction to a quite alarming kind of positioning which cannot be allowed in our theaters where harmony and striving for a true community experience remain our main mission. best wishes Peter de Caluwe
Our social secretary has just received this message from the Berlin Phil:
We congratulate Magdalena Kožena and Simon Rattle on the birth of Anežka, their first daughter, born in Berlin at 4.50 this morning, 21 June. The whole family is already at home meeting Anežka’s brothers, Jonas and Milos.
Wir gratulieren Magdalena Kožena und Simon Rattle zur Geburt ihrer ersten Tochter Anežka. Anežka wurde am 21. Juni 2014 um 4.50 Uhr morgens in Berlin geboren. Die gesamte Familie ist wohlauf und bereits zuhause, wo Anežka nun ihre beiden großen Brüder Jonas und Milos kennenlernt. (Photo: Sheila Rock)
The Guardian published a thoughtful, slightly counter-intuitive op-ed yesterday by the English economist and intellectual, Noreena Hertz.
Noreena supports Met Opera chief Peter Gelb’s cancellation of The Death of Klinghoffer relay ‘at this time of rising antisemitism, particularly in Europe’ and furnishes it with credible statistics. She quotes an ADL survey: ‘ 24% of people in western Europe (37% in France, 29% in Spain, 27% in Germany, 69% in Greece) and 34% in eastern Europe (41% in Hungary, 45% in Poland, 38% in Ukraine) harboured antisemitic views.’
However, in justifying the Met’s cancellation, Noreena Hertz promotes an artistic taboo that, in our view, cannot be helpful either for intellectual clarity or for the fight against racism. Here’s here conclusion:
The Death of Klinghoffer neither condemns nor condones the execution of the American Jew Leon Klinghoffer by Palestinian terrorists. In the world of opera this may be acceptable. This may be the prerogative of art. In the real world not taking a stand against antisemitism is categorically not an option.
Would that mean a ban on Merchant of Venice, Oliver Twist, Richard Wagner, T. S. Eliot and certain works of Conan Doyle and Agatha Christie?
Isn’t it better to name the beast than to push it under the bed? Few stage works express Arab anti-semitism more directly than Klinghoffer. Gelb’s ban suppresses that recognition.
Nothing is gained by censorship except the closing of minds. Evil exists in this world and art must seek to confront it.
Anti-semitism is a resurgent evil. Let’s name it, shame it and keep it under discussion.
