From our correspondent in Beijing:

The National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing on Sunday announced an emergency recall of tickets because all the seats for the Mahler’s 8th scheduled on Oct 30, including the stall behind the stage, were available for sale.

All of a sudden, they realized that the work requires a chorus.

Actually three choruses. And eight soloists. That’s why it’s called Symphony of 1,000.

Ah well, they’ll get it right next time. The symphony had its Beijing premiere in 2002.

Update: And here’s the most recent Mahler Eighth in Beijing, conducted by Charles Dutoit on October 6 with the China Philharmonic Ochestra at Poly theatre. The concert on the 30th is due to be conducted by Yoel Levi. It’s raining Mahler 8s in Beijing.

And in Tapiei, where there were two performances on the 9th and 10th.

There were five envelopes in the Citigroup mailbox by Wednesday, but there’s word now of a late run by James Caparro, a former Universal Music and Warner flak who has been whiling away his days in distribution.

Caparro’s firm is Yamani Global Equities, and he’s backed by Alliance Warburg Capital Management. In a press release, Caparro said: “This is the first step in the execution of our turnaround plan to guide EMI’s assets through the integration of our five prong revenue model that will lead the company into providing consumers and customers with music and entertainment services utilising 21st century technologies”.

Wassat? He’s even more convoluted than the last rack of EMI suits. Imagine what Sir Thomas Beecham would have made of that load of verbiage.

When the Metropolitan Opera wants to know what’s going on in the world, it does not read the New York Times, which functions part-time as its press department, but tears open the nasty, blue-collar New York Post.

Today the Post reports a looming divorce between Texas oil heir Sid Bass and his formerly dearly beloved Mercedes after 23 years of inseparable opera going. Mercedes has given the Met gifts of $25 million. Any future donations will depend on the size of her divorce settlement.

Here’s the Post story.

photo: Marina Garner

I’ll be sure to let the Met know when Alberto Vilar gets out of jail. He could be their saviour yet again.

The Finnish conductor Leif Segerstam, a Disney shoo-in for Saint Nick, may look like the man from Lapland but he’s not the easiest of household guests. Elemental, organic and all that goes with it, if you get my drift.

Still, no-one’s saying a word why Father Christmas won’t be visiting Bavaria next year. He was down to conduct a run of Rosenkavaliers but he has been replaced by Constantin Trinks, who (I’m told) was said slightly undercooked at his last performance.

There are dark mutterings of ‘political differences’ that no-one will confirm. Leif has probably gone off to write another of his symphonies, number 252 by the latest reckoning. It’s what he does when things don’t go his way.

Lorin Maazel has just tweeted that he’s selling the precious violin he has owned since he was 16.

It’s a Guadagnini of 1783 and it goes under the hammer on November 10 at a price tag of around $1 million. The proceeds will go toward the private Carstleton Festival that he holds on his estate for young performers. More details here.

The Swedish singer Ingvar Wixell has died, aged 80.

A huge bear of a man, he sang Tosca’s Scarpia Barber’s Figaro and Carmen’s Escamillo  in Munich, Berlin and London, reaching the Met only in 1973 with Rigoletto.

Less well remembered was his role in choosing Sweden’s Eurovision entry for 1965, when he performed all the selected songs and took the winner, Absent Friend, to the final in Naples.

Here‘s a screen-grab from those innocent times.