Cecilia Bartoli will be singing two arias with Andrea Bocelli on his new album, ‘Believe’, out next month.

The most particular of mezzos with the most popular living tenor.

Who’d have believed it?

NOW READ: When Bartoli first met Bocelli, sparks flew

The chorus of the Metropolitan Opera, unpaid for six months, have recorded a project with Rhiannon Giddens in response to the Black Lives Matter movement.

Called Cry No More, it’s powerful stuff.

Anna Prohaska performs in May 2020 for her Berlin neighbours.

One of Ravel’s birds of paradise, the perfect image of escape.

The orchestra tonight released a thank-you video to their supporters.

Under Covid constraints they played Haydn with just three performers, two of them women: principal bassoon Sophie Dervaux, and flute players Karl-Heinz Schütz and Karin Bonelli

Now that’s a first.

The Czech Republic is banning all live music with singing for two weeks from next Monday, due to rising Covid numbers. Instrumental music is still permitted.

The Janáček Brno Festival opened last night with Osud, directed by Robert Carsen, and will close next week.

The trailblazing singer died a year ago today.

This is Ravel’s setting of the Jewish memorial prayer in its High Holydays tune.

Leipzig has just announced an International Richard Wagner Festival with all 13 operas from 20 June to 14 July 2022.

All well and good, Covid permitting.

But what’s unusual is the the festival has been named in honour of Gustav Brecher, the city’s general music director who was abused and kicked out by the Nazis in February 1933 and erased from history. Brecher, who was Jewish, fled to Prague and, when it was occupied, to Ostend. When the Germans entered Belgium in May 1940, he died by suicide together with his wife.

He was 61, a world-class conductor who had brought major operas by Weill and Krenek to the stage.

This is Leipzig’s belated act of restitution.

Markus Felsner, ex-Opus3 and newly established in Munich, has scooped up Greek soprano Christina Poulitsi (pictured), Austrian tenor Thomas Ebenstein and Italian mezzo Teresa Romano.

Interartists Amsterdam has recruited Rozemarijn Tiben from London’s Intermusica to create a vocal division. She has signed Vienna Opera baritone Orhan Yildiz and Dutch soprano Channa Malkin.

Some stirrings also at IMG. They have taken on conductor Robert Tuohy and the Castalian String Quartet.

Hit by a minor tsunami of criticism after firing its German music chief Ulrich Hauschild, the Bozar Bozar (Palais des Beaux-Arts) has promoted his assistant Jérome Giersé as the new chief.

He’s younger and cheaper. That’s all we know about him. Like most unscrutinised appointments in Brussels, the rest is silence.

Seven musicians of the Salzburg Camerata have tested positive for Covid-19 and been quarantined.

This week’s rehearsals and the season’s opening concert have been called off. Camerata managing director Shane Woodborne says: ‘The health protection of the audience and artists is our top priority. The Camerata Salzburg very much regrets having to postpone the concerts planned for the season opening on Friday, October 2nd, at 5:30 pm and 8:30 pm, and on Sunday, October 4th, at 11:00 am and 2:00 pm.’

This summer Salzburg managed to stage a successful Covid-free festival, but it now looks like the second wave is kicking in.

Take care.

The Russian soprano, recovering from Russian-strain Covid, has told La Scala she will sing an impromptu aria concert there on October 21.

Riccardo Chailly will conduct.

Programme:

Giuseppe Verdi
from Aida
Sinfonia
Ritorna vincitor

from Don Carlo
Tu che le vanità

Amilcare Ponchielli
from Gioconda
Danza delle Ore
Suicidio!

Francesco Cilea
from Adriana Lecouvreur
Preludio Atto IV – Poveri fiori

Giacomo Puccini
from Madama Butterfly
Preludio Atto III
Un bel dì vedremo