Seven year-old Leah Flynn’s people inform us that her appearance on Slipped Disc earlier this week led to an invitation to Chicago, to play on Fox News. Her message has drawn tremendous response from the troubled community in Ferguson.

You’ll never see this sort of film on network US network television any more. It comes from Al-Jazeera America and it shed the spotlight on the conductor’s efforts to teach ‘all 83,000 children in Baltimore public schools’, not to mention conducting students at Peabody and a new program for aspiring women conductors.

Watch.

More here.

John Allison, in the December issue of Opera magazine (quoted in Der Neue Merker):

Our reviewer of Covent Garden’s I Due Foscari, is measured when writing about Placido Domingo, but he does make it clear that the baritone’s Francesco Foscari was a disappointment. In the Sunday Times, Hugh Canning was more direct. Observing that this must have been the first time a Domingo opening aria went un-applauded at the ROH, he reported, “His voice is a shadow of its former self, lacking resonance in barely sketched-in low notes…As ever, he presents a figure of great dignity, but the state of his voice means he can no longer do justice to Verdi or to his own reputation. He has often said that he would know the time to retire, but on the evidence of the opening night, sadly, that time has past.

It’s not only our ears that are signaling this, but a few straightforward sums too. By most reckonings, Domingo has been singing on stage for an incredible 57 years. Though the exact number of candles that belong on his birthday cake is likely to be the subject of an annual squabble, several in the know claim that he recently reached a nice round number, which of course makes his performances all the more astonishing.

In last month’s ‘We hear that…’we leaked news of his 2017 Posa in Don Carlos in Vienna, which will be one for the record books if he has not switched to The Grand Inquisitor by then. As George Loomis notes this month in his review of the new Giovanna d’Arco recording on which Domingo tackles Giacomo, the singer has been rapacious in his clean-up of the Verdi baritone repertoire. In February in Berlin Domingo will add Macbeth to this gallery.

No one would have foreseen this when, beginning in 2009, Domingo was encouraged by several houses to sing Simon Boccanegra. It was a worthwhile indulgence, perhaps, to try something different, having notched up 130 tenor roles, Domingo had certainly earned himself the right to try something different. The then tenor had apparently already been nicknamed ‘Mingo’ on account of lacking a ‘Do’ (or C), but maybe this descent into baritone territory should have been a final homecoming for the singer- after all, he started out as a baritone- rather than a pension plan. Subsequent vocal decline apart, Domingo has always lacked something in this reincarnation: unable to show off any high notes, he can relax in the register where a true Verdian baritone would have to push, resulting with little of the visceral thrill one associates with this music. Domingo may have baritone notes, but Verdian drama is geared to the musculature and timbre of a real baritone.

Domingo’s baritonal adventures raise all manner of other issues, and involve other artistic compromises too. It is hard to believe that Covent Garden would have brought in Thaddeus Strassberger’s Foscari production if it hadn’t been part of the package. It is also ironic that Domingo’s own Operalia competition rewards the best vocal style and technique, when these things have audibly deserted the singer; and can really be said to be supporting young singers when he is hogging the stage from the next generation of baritones? Domingo’s quasi-philanthropic reasons in work pale next to the good he can still do elsewhere as a figurehead and promoter of opera. His addiction to the greasepaint may be understandable, but audience memories of his glory days are already faded. Perhaps he should stop before too many people begin questioning their loyalty to his great artistry.

This is the American mezzo, Elizabeth DeShong, at a photoshoot for her Vienna Opera debut in Cenerentola. She’s either massaging an injured shoulder or adjusting some faulty tailoring.

Stanislavsky always said: stand up straight.

photo (c) Dario Acosta

The backstage crisis is over.

Having got rid of her distinguished technical director and his deputy, Katherine the Great Wagner has hired Christoph Bauch, technical director at the enterprising Theater an der Wien. It’s the lure of Bayreuth: they cannot resist a call from the Green Hill.

Charles Beare, the violin expert and dealer who retired from the historic family in 2012, cannot bear to be out of things. He’s back in business, in competition with J & A Beare. Charles, who advised three generations of virtuosi, is 77. The fiddle business is hotting up.

Here’s the note Charles sent out last night:

Dear Friends and Colleagues,
I am very pleased to inform you that I am now able to resume normal business and do what I enjoy most, giving opinions and other advice on musical instruments, principally of the violin family.  I am doing this through Beare Violins Ltd, which has since 1998 been the name of the family company that was founded in 1892 and incorporated in 1954.  My son Peter is making new instruments as well as working with me, and we are joined by Ute Wegerhoff (our very skilled restorer who has worked with us since 1992) and Katharine Oakeshott (who has been my personal assistant since 2004).

Initially our services will be available on Tuesdays and Thursdays and will be by appointment only, but our intention is to make available again our experience of instruments of the highest quality, old and new.   Beare Violins Ltd has had a small workshop in Kent since 1991, and by March 2015 we hope to have completed the restoration of a neighbouring building in which we look forward to being able to welcome you more warmly and suitably.  In the meantime we can be contacted at the postal address below or by email at bvl@beareviolins.com.

We are no longer connected with J & A Beare Ltd or Beare & Son.

With best regards,

Charles Beare.

Our friend and colleague Ariane Todes has written a long and thoughtful piece in defence of competitions, rallying really useful information from competitors, judges and organisers. Testimony such as:

I’ve seen all sorts of dishonest things happen on juries. No matter how hard the administration tries there are still things that go on which are very difficult to stop. Of course in any of the major competitions you can’t vote for your own students, but there is a certain quid pro quo. ‘I can’t vote for my student but you can; you can’t vote for your student, but I can.’ Teachers have their lives at stake. They have a parental love for the student and it’s also going to be good for their career if their student wins, so how can they possibly be objective?

Read the full article here. You may have to wait a couple of moments for the website to function. Have patience.

Jacques Barrot, president of the Festival de La Chaise-Dieu, has collapsed and died on the Paris Métro at the Sablons station, near Neuilly. He was 77.

Barrot served as a minister in several French governments under Giscard d’Estaing and Chirac. He rose to become European Commissioner for Justice in 2008, despite having been convicted of embezzling government funds in 2000 and funneling them to his party.

The international music festival was his retirement hobby.

She has been making waves at the keyboard, first as Riccardo Muti’s rehearsal assistant, more recently leading her own productions from the harpsichord. Many in the biz think Speranza Scappucci is in for a big baton career. Numerous agents have been bidding for her hand.

Speranza has chosen Stephen Wright at ICA to manage her worldwide.

Watch.

Tomorrow night in Naples Rachmaninov’s ghost will appear and give a “live” recital at Teatro Mediterraneo.

It’s an idea conceived by the Italian pianist Roberto Prosseda together with Julius Tuomisto, CEO of the Finnish software company Delicode. Through tech wizardry, Rachmaninov’s ghost will be seen performing 11 pieces that were recorded by the composer on piano rolls. Prosseda will then interview Rachmaninov on stage.

The animated 3D image of Rachmaninov’s ghost has been realized by Delicode, using its own softwares Ni-Mate and Z-Vector. The animated speaking face of Rachmaninov was realized by the Italian computer graphic artist Adriano Mestichella.

‘This project,’ says Prosseda, ‘has been conceived to bring classical music to people beyond the traditional audience. Only the 2 or 3 percent of the population normally attends piano recitals, and our goal is to reach the other 98 percent, using an innovative and attractive format, but still focusing on great music.’

The Ghost Concert is the opening event of PianocityNapoli, an innovative festival based on the pianocity format developed by Andreas Kern, which will present 200 piano recitals and 300 pianists in Napoli in three days between Dec. 5th and 7th.

Our New York operavores, Elizabeth Frayer and Shawn Milnes, have been to the Met’s Meistersinger. They’re on aspirin for the rest of the week.

And they raise the interesting question of who, exactly, is paying the tenor. Read here.