There’s a new co-principal horn at San Francisco Opera.

His name is Mark Almond, he’s from Manchester, England and he has played guest principal with several London orchestras before heading abroad.

Unusually, he read medicine at Oxford and Cambridge and qualified as a respiratory physician.

Three early favourites – Mone Hattori, Shiori Terauchi and Eva Rabchevska – have failed to make the third round of the Wieniawski Competition in Poznan.

All three are students of Zakhar Bron, who sits on the jury.

Some insiders suggest this might indicate a backlash against the controversial judge.

Here are the third round qualifiers:

Our weekend has been much enhanced by the discovery of Shittyflute, a Youtube channel that will cause your eyes to water, for one reason or other.

Try this:

More here.

Wasfi Kani, head of the relocated Grange Park Opera which reopens in Surrey next summer, doesn’t expect everyone to turn up in formal wear.

The new dress code reads: ‘Guests wear something stylish. Most of the audience wears black tie/ long or short dress, but don’t be afraid to stand out from the crowd. We encourage creativity.’

What she means, she tells the Telegraph, is: ‘People can wear whatever they like. A nice Italian suit is a better piece of clothing than a tatty old dinner jacket. We don’t all have to have the same life.’

Trainers will be welcomed, provided they are very expensive.

Berlin’s Komische Oper, whose recent chief conductors include Kirill Petrenko and the late Yakov Kreizberg, has got itself into a tangle over its next music director.

The incumbent, Henrik Nanasi, is on the way out. A shortlist of six has yielded one outstanding candidate who is well liked by the artistic director and ovated by the public in Barber of Seville.

Antonella Manacorda, 46, is a former Abbado concertmaster who studied with Jorma Panula and now heads the orchestra at Arnhem in the Netherlands.

He is also rumoured to have a Sony record deal, according to the combative Manuel Brug in Die Welt.

But musicians of the excellent Komische Oper orchestra have voted him down.

They want a bigger name.

Simon Rattle has been mentioned. (Won’t happen: Manacorda shares an agent with Rattle.) So they’ve got stalemate.

Story here.

The neo-tonal Dutch composer arouses heated opinions on Sipped Disc.

He has a premiere coming up in London on October 23. Go hear for yourself.

Ask nicely and we might offer a couple of tickets.