The Berlin state opera chief, who conducted at Bayreuth from 1981 to 1999, has launched a rocket attack on festival director Katharina Wagner after her lawyers removed her half-sister Eva Wagner-Pasquier from this summer’s festival. Eva, 70, is due to retire in August.

Daniel Barenboim said in a statement: ‘Gibt es in einem freien demokratischen Land für ein solches Verfahren eine rechtliche Grundlage? Ich dachte, man kann den Menschen ihre Bewegungsfreiheit nicht nehmen – außer sie wären Kriminelle. Dieser Umgang ist menschenunwürdig. (Is there any legal basis for such a move in a free, democratic country? I thought you can’t take away people’s freedom of movement – unless they are criminals. This action is the opposite of humane.)’

 

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What Barenboim fails to distinguish is that Bayreuth is not part of a free and democratic country. It is a hereditary autocracy run by members of the Wagner family, none of whom answers to the rules of common decency.

The conductor Kirill Petrenko is threatening, on similar grounds, to withdraw from this summer’s Ring. The only happy maestro at Bayreuth is Christian Thielemann (pictured below with Katie and advisors).

katharina wagner thielemann

On Monday, the London office of K D Schmid signed the timpanist-turned-conductor Adrien Perruchon.

On Tuesday, the Berlin office announced the signing of the 2015 Malko Competition winner, Tung-Chieh Chuang, 32. He’s from Taiwan but lives in Berlin.

Who’s next?

 

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Slipped Disc editorial

The former Chetham’s violin and head of strings at Royal Northern College of Music was cleared within 90 minutes by a jury of the single charge on which he was tried; the alleged rape of an 18 year-old female student some 30 years ago. Layfield, 63, is under British justice, cleared of all stigma and is free to resume his career.

But the issue of sexual exploitation and abuse at English music schools has not gone away.

In court, under oath, Layfield admitted with regret to having several affairs with his students at Chetham’s during the 1980s. He was not the only teacher to do so. Evidence was heard that Chetham’s was, at best, negligent during that period in exercising its duty of care towards vulnerable teenagers. Further evidence indicated that complaints by students against teachers who abused their authority in this way were not dealt with in an appropriate manner.

Sexual abuse in English music schools has been covered up for a full generation. Those who engaged in the cover-up – governors, headteachers, teachers – have not been called to account. There remains a strong case for a public inquiry to be held where both victims and those in authority can raise their voices and lay the wretched past to rest.

The law is a blunt instrument. Malcolm Layfield, innocent, will have to rebuild his practice from scratch. A public inquiry would obviate the need for further prosecutions and allow the healing process to begin.

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UPDATE: More legal action here.

 

 

An allergic reaction to a wasp sting is believed to have caused the death of Kelly Thomas, professor of music at the University of Tennessee Knoxville.

The tragedy was announced on Facebook by the University of Arizona’s Fred Fox School of Music, where Kelly previously taught before moving to his wife’s home state. He was the founding tuba player for the Original Wildcat Jass Band and was recently elected vice-president of the International Tuba-Euphonium Association.

Kelly leaves four young children. A memorial fund has been set up for the family here.

 

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A new website says he spent much of his life in Vienna covering up his black origins.

It goes on to argue that all European interpreters have misread his rhythms.

This is not a new supposition: it comes around every once in a while. But this time there’s a recording to support it.

Hey-ho.

Beethoven black

The Bolshoi website reports the death of Valery Leventhal, a stage designer at the theatre from 1963 and head of stage design (chief artist’), from 1988 to 1995. He was 76.

He revitalised the look of Bolshoi opera in Boris Pokrovsky productions. His sets included Tosca and Butterfly, Prokofiev’s Semyon Kotko (pictured), Betrothal at the Monastery and The Gambler,Shchedrin’s  Anna Karenina, Dead Souls, Seagull and Lady with the Lapdog and much else, including many ballets. 

He also created a department of stage design in Moscow.

LeventalBAL312255 Stage design for Prokofiev's opera Semyon Kotko, 1970 (tempera on plywood) by Levental, Valery Jakovlevich (b.1938); State Museum and Exhibition Centre ROSIZO, Moscow; (add.info.: Semyon Kotko (Cemeh Komko in Russian) is an opera in five acts by Sergei Prokofiev (Op. 81) to a libretto by Sergei Prokofiev and Valentin Katayev based on Valentin Katayev's 1937 novel I Am The Son Of Working People;); Russian,  in copyright

PLEASE NOTE: This image is protected by the artist's copyright which needs to be cleared by you. If you require assistance in clearing permission we will be pleased to help you.

 

Rani Calderon has been named music director at the Opéra National de Lorraine in Nancy. He is the first Israeli conductor to hold that position in any Frence theatre.

He was previously principal conductor at Teatro Municipal in Santiago de Chile and a very busy guest conductor.

RANI CALDERON

Malcolm Layfield, former violin teacher at Chetham’s School of Music and head of strings at RNCM, has been found not guilty of rape, according to journalist tweets from Manchester Crown Court. The jury took less than two hours to reach their verdict.

Layfield, now 63, had insisted his sexual relationship with the teenager had been consensual, as it had been in his relations with other students around the same time, in the 1980s.

More here.

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Go on, who was he?

None other than my Album of the Week on sinfinimusic.com, a long-scorned master of the string quartet who is finally coming into his own. No more clues. Click here.

ruggieri quartet

When two conductors cancelled on the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France last December, up stepped the timpanist and did a terrific job.

Adrien Perruchon, 32, had been taking lessons with Esa-Pekka Salonen, François-Xavier Roth and Alain Altinoglu.

As of today, he is a fully-fledged conductor with a contract at a major agency. He will be managed by the London office of KD Schmid, the Hannover agency that walks big and tall since it signed Andris Nelsons to Boston.

Go, Adrien!

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Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, who wrote his tenth symphony while in hospital with leukaemia, has been awarded the South Bank Sky Arts Award by an esoteric television channel.

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press release:

Sir Peter Maxwell Davies’ Symphony No 10, which was commissioned and given its world premiere by the London Symphony Orchestra and conductor Sir Antonio Pappano, has won a prestigious South Bank Sky Arts award in the Classical category. The award was presented to Sir Peter today by violinist Tasmin Little at a ceremony at London’s Savoy Hotel, hosted by Melvyn Bragg.

Kathryn McDowell, Managing Director of the London Symphony Orchestra said: “Completing a 10th Symphony has beaten some of music’s greatest composers. Not so with Max, who courageously battled leukaemia to finish his 10th Symphony from his hospital bed, and recovered sufficiently to attend the premiere. This was a work that had to be written. The LSO is thrilled to have commissioned the 10th Symphony, which gave the orchestra, the London Symphony Chorus and LSO Choral Director Simon Halsey, baritone Markus Butter, and conductor Sir Antonio Pappano a challenge that was hugely rewarding, as witnessed by all those present at the premiere. Thank you Max for a great work.”

 

 

From a correspondent:

On 31 January 2015, Georg Christoph Biller, 59, retired from his position as Cantor of the St. Thomas School.

He was the sixteenth person to hold this post since Johann Sebastian Bach, having begun his tenure on the first day of Advent in 1992. The reasons for his stepping down after twenty-two years of service were health-related and personal.

The leader of the parish of St. Thomas, Britta Taddiken, announced in reference to Biller’s retirement that “one of the truly great Thomaskantor eras has now come to an end.” His having maintained the St. Thomas choir over so many years at a world-class level has earned him, in her words, the “greatest respect.” Biller’s last official performance will take place on 17 June 2015 in the context of the Leipzig Bachfest. He will lead the choir in the premiere of a work by Stephan König, which is dedicated to him and to them.

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