From the diva’s Instagram account today.

Dale Johnson will step down as artistic director of Minnesota Opera at the end of the season after 23 years in the job and 33 with the company.

He will continue to advise President and General Director Ryan Taylor on new work and new artists.

Over the past month, I have been contacted by at least half a dozen news organisations and journalists, all of whom request my help on investigations they were conducting into allegations of misconduct against the emeritus music director of the Metropolitan Opera. They included Reuters, AP, BBC Newsnight and other well-known operations.

I refused, with one exception, to respond to any request since it was clear to me that these were no more than speculative fishing expeditions. There was, and remains, no evidence to substantiate a welter of suppositions against Mr Levine. Like everyone in the music world, I have heard rumours and investigated some of them. None has been supported by independent third-party testimony.

The accuser whose story is told in the New York Post contacted me many months ago and several times since. I advised him at first contact to report the matter to the police, which he did. I have his deposition. It is alarming and unpleasant. It is backed by a diary the kept at age 16. It is not, however, substantiated by any other witness.

On this basis, I declined to publish his allegations. So, too, did the New York Times, which (I am told) is conducting its own inquiry into an incident, possibly related to the Brooklyn Bridge.

The rumours about James Levine remain rumours until proven. Unless they are, he has no case to answer.

In these extraordinarily dangerous times, when superpower leaders are wilfully blurring the line between truth and lie, there is a duty on journalists to stick to the facts, the whole facts and nothing but the facts. That rule applies in James Levine’s case as it does in every other.

NL

UPDATE: Boston Symphony statement

UPDATE: The Met suspends Levine

UPDATE: Who has questions to answer?

The Opéra de Paris has opened a provocative new production of La Bohème by Claus Guth.

Baby, it’s cold outside.

Life on Mars? No, that was Bowie.

Get me outa here!

The director’s hut.

all photos (c) Bernd Uhlig/Opéra National de Paris

Following the allegation of sexual molestation by its former music director that were published last night by the New York Post, the Met has issued this advisory:

The Met would like to let our supporters know that we are deeply disturbed by the news articles that are being published online today about James Levine. We are working on an investigation with outside resources to determine whether charges of sexual misconduct in the 1980s are true, so that we can take appropriate action.

Menahem Pressler, 94 this month, rehearsing ‘en bateau’ in Jerusalem, with Iddo Bar Shai.

Video courtesy of Lady Annabelle Weidenfeld.

A survey by the Incorporated Society of Musicians finds that 60 percent of classical musicians have experienced sexual harassment, rising to 70 percent among the self-employed.

There were, however, just 250 responses to the survey.

In Sweden, a much smaller country, almost 700 opera singers declared they had been harassed, practically the entire profession.

The tonal composer William Mayer, best known for a prize-winning opera A Death in the Family, died at home in Manhattan on November 17.

The newspaper has just gone live with this report:

Legendary Metropolitan Opera conductor James Levine molested an Illinois teenager from the time he was 15 years old, sexual abuse that lasted for years and led the alleged victim to the brink of suicide, according to a police report obtained by The Post…

Read on here.

Neither Levine nor his New York agent returned multiple requests for comment. A spokesman for the Met did not respond to repeated requests for comment. Its general manager, Peter Gelb, did not return a message.

The report is based on a deposition made to Illinois police in 2016 by an unnamed person. There has been no independent corroboration.

UPDATE: The Met issues statement on James Levine.

UPDATE2: James Levine: A note of caution.

UPDATE3: Boston Symphony statement.

UPDATE4: The Met suspends Levine.

UPDATE5: Who has questions to answer?

UPDATE6: Levine denies

UPDATE7: Orchestra parents warned their sons about Levine

UPDATE 8: Will this kill the Met?

UPDATE 9: Did Leonard Bernstein have a James Levine problem? 

UPDATE 10: The Met’s musicians respond

UPDATE 11: Opera is a breeding ground for sexual misconduct

UPDATE 12: The human cost of the James Levine climate

UPDATE 13: Levine is fired.

UPDATE 14: Levine sues the Met for unfair dismissal.

UPDATE 15: Levine’s accuser says his story was suppressed.

Rush-hour commuters at London’s Marylebone Station were faced last night by a pop-up Messiah, organised by the conductor Nicolas Cleobury.

Some of the singers are well-known pros.

The fund-raiser is in aid of Singing for Syrians, helping to get medical aid to victims of a brutal war.

All money raised goes directly to projects helping Syrians inside Syria (where possible), including paying doctors’ wages in rural southern Aleppo, running a kindergarten in Idleb and funding a number of prosthetic limb clinics. It is estimated that over 30,000 Syrians, children and adults, are amputees in need of urgent treatment. A prosthetic limb below the knee costs just £270 to fit, restoring dignity, independence and the ability to work.
Our aim is sustainability, which is why we focus on funding salaries and long-term work in health and education. We specifically choose projects that have the maximum impact for those in need, and monitor them regularly.

Last night, Odyssey Opera and the Boston Modern Orchestra Project gave the world stage premiere of Norman Dello Joio’s The Trial at Rouen, based on the last hours of Joan of Arc.

Dello Joio (1913-2008) was a leading American composer in his time. Joan of Arc was his lifelong obsession.

The opera was surely worth a fragment of media attention. But there was no preview and, so far, no review.

The only notice appears in Boston Classical Review.

That’s the sorry state of opera in US media these day, folks.

From the Lebrecht Album of the Week:

For a brief window in the 1690s – until the night Mrs Purcell shut her husband out in the cold – London was the go-to place for young composers in search of top tuition and an appreciative audience. Italians like Arcangelo Corelli were keen to study with Henry Purcell and English composers grew in confidence. Then, one November night in 1695, Mrs P decided not to stay up til her old man got back from the theatre and poor Henry caught cold and died, or so the story goes. Two centuries would elapse before England bred another composer of his quality…

More here.

And here.