Placido Domingo halts his football stadium Aida
mainHe was supposed to conduct the opening performance of a spectacular Aida in Vienna’s Allianz Stadium this June, ahead of a world tour. The previews spoke of 800 performers, live horses and lots of slaves.
But the stage technology is not working so the show has been postponed to June 2018.
Just in time for the World Cup.
And lots of microphones. More populist dreck involving Domingo, I see.
…and off the record it is being alleged that the real problem was lack of ticket sales…
And this was precisely the reason why his first-ever arena concert in London back in the late 1980s was cancelled at just a few days’ notice. But then that was all before the Three Tenors jamboree.
I am reminded of the multitude of Aida arena and open-air concerts arranged and conducted by Giuseppe Raffia in the 1990s and early 2000s. In Mexico his set was impounded because he hadn’t paid bills and a totally new one had to be constructed for the next performances in Hong Kong. In Australia he fled the country before the performances even took place leaving ticket holders losing their money and an official enquiry by the NSW Department of Fair Trading. A new Nabucco venture in South Africa was cancelled and further performances encountered problems in the south of France and Budapest. I’m not suggesting that Domingo’s new venture was on such rocky financial ground, but my belief is that the days of arena spectaculars are over – at least for the next decade or so.
Ah yes, opera for people who don’t go to the opera. Was the cast to include Paul Potts and Katherine Jenkins by any chance?