The hit version

The author’s version

The heartbreak version

The edge of darkness version

The post-modern

From the NY Times:

The Metropolitan Opera, which ordinarily can hold nearly 4,000 people, says it would be able to seat an audience of 400 if it introduces social distancing, making its already delicate financial model untenable. ‘I can’t imagine any scenario in which performances can take place at the Met when social distancing is still a factor,’ said Peter Gelb, the opera’s general manager.

That’s fairly definitive.

 

The Italian press agency ANSA reports that the annual Puccini Opera Festival at Torre del Lago will go ahead on June 26-August 14.

The three operas on the agenda are Tosca, Madama Butterfly and Gianni Schicchi.

Sir Antonio Pappano will conduct the Orchestra Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in a 28 July Beethoven concert.

That’s four festivals now up and running: Pesaro, Ravenna, Torre del lago, Martina Franca.

The Valle d’Itria Festival says it will take place in modified form from 14 July to 2 August in the Apulia town of Martina Franca.

The programme includes two Strauss operas in the open air – Ariadne auf Naxos and Le bourgeois gentilhomme –

The music director is Fabio Luisi.

Report here.

 

There has been a merciful diminution in the number of Covid deaths reported worldwide in the music community over the past fortnight. Let’s hope we’re coming to the end of it.

What’s puzzling, though, is that not a single musical death in Russia has been ascribed to Covid-19. There has been an unusually high number of fatalities reported in the past week – a Bolshoi curator, a respected violin professor, a music critic, a conductor, a ballet professor and more. No mention of the virus, except here and there a euphemism ‘of a swift disease’. There is pressure from above not to report Covid. Self-censorship is back.

These are our losses this week in the rest of the world:

 

76  Derek Weber, veteran Salzburg Nachrichten music critic, 73 (pictured)

77  Joseph Policelli, Massachussetts organist and music professor, 71

78 Queen manager Jack Nelson, 77

79 Alabama music teacher Carl Matthews, 92

80 Bristol musician Junior Hines, 67

81 Paschal Allen, Covent Garden opera singer, 87

82 Minneapolis pianist Thelma Irene Johnson, 96

Previous weeks here.

The Zagreb Philharmonic Orchestra gave a concert yesterday on the swan island of Zagreb zoo. The musicians are distanced from the audience but not from each other.

We might give a tolerant smile if it wasn’t all so bloody tragic.

 

Photo from Xinhua

The German pianist played 52 nights online in lockdown. Then he stopped.

He tells Fiona Maddocks why:

I needed a pause, time off, silence. These concerts were, literally, and from the bottom of my heart, life-saving – mentally, physically, emotionally. So my gratitude to every single person who listened is infinite, immeasurable. I was able to be who I am. I just played the music I wanted, crazy stuff, without borders. Soon enough, I’ll be back.

Full interview here.

UPDATE: He’s resuming tonight.

Kafka’s friend, polymath, composer, theatrical dramaturg.

Riveting interview.