There have been work stoppages at several companies over the past two days in anticipation of today’s resumption of wage-bargaining talks by orchestral players and stage staff.

Stoppages of up to half an hour were called at Frankfurt, Nuremberg, Kassel, Leipzig, Giessen, Halle Reutlingen and Münster. Players in state orchestras are seeking a 2.1 percent pay rise.

(2014 picture at the Berlin Philharmonie)

The Ministry of Culture has published the 2014 salaries of the heads of Russia’s leading arts institutions. It’s a revealing chart. In first place, earning six times more than the next orchestra chief, is…. well you’ve guessed:

1 Valery Gergiev                340 million rubles ($6.9m)

2 Vladimir Spivakov         57 million rubles ($1.2m)
Artistic Director of the National Philharmonic Orchestra of Russia

3 Yuri Temirkanov           42 million rubles ($850,000)
St Peterbsburg Philharmonic

4 Vladimir Fedoseyev        34 million rubles ($670,000)
Bolshoi symphony orchestra

5 Vladimir Jurowsky          25 million rubles ($500,000)
Svetlanov symphony orchestra

A New York lawyer contesting an alimony suit from his fifth wife in a London court was relieved yesterday to receive judgement that he could keep his Steinway baby grand.

Counsel for Richard Fields pleaded that his third wife had won his first Steinway in their divorce settlement, leaving him brokenhearted.

‘That wife took the piano from him. He had to relinquish the piano. He wanted such a piano. He went out and bought another such piano,’ said Stephen Trowell QC. The instrument is valued at $100,000.

Nobody mentioned the cat.