The ultimate stocking splitter (for those who still wear stockings).

In memoriam, here she is singing out in 1988 with Robert De Cormier and the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra at Ely Cathedral.

Sheer magnificence.

We will not see her like again.

Message from the violin diva:

My most wonderful furry companion of 10 years – Clyde – passed away on November the 3rd.
She was strong like a lion and went hunting up until almost her last hour.
I miss her terribly.

It’s the day we miss the ones who are gone.

Austrian singers Elisabeth Kulman (classical) and Agnes Heginger (jazz) on a Colombian beach.

It takes all sorts.

Who’d have thought?

The Toronto Symphony has reversed comic decline to become an international magnet, with funds to match.

The Canadian Opera Company has supplied Paris with its next opera boss.

Tafelmusik is doing well and the Royal Con is selling out every recital.

What went right?

Read here.

Singers Jamie Barton, Kevin Burdette, Michael Mayes and Morris Robinson have formed a high-powered Artistic Advisory Council for Atlanta Opera. All four have close connections to the city and the state.

The horn player Robert Creech – former principal with the Victoria Symphony, Winnipeg, Vancouver, Stratford and CBC – has died in Ireland, where he lived from 1994.

After a period as professor at the University of Western Ontario, he became Vice-Principal of The Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto in 1989 and subsequently CEO of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Society from 1991 to 1994.

Liverpool was entering all sorts of turmoil and Creech survived just one short-term contract before settling happily in Ireland.

It’s a Paris orchestra of no great pedigree, but just listen to that bassoon. And those woodwinds.

This is how it’s meant to sound.