In an act of breathtaking international insensitivity, the 23rd Beijing Music Festival opened this weekend with the premiere of a symphony, ‘Dedicated to 2020’ by a composer from Wuhan, Zou Ye. It is supposed to represent the victory over Coronavirus.

The composer conducted the Wuhan Philharmonic Orchestra, the Beijing Symphony Orchestra and Wuhan-born musicians from the China Philharmonic Orchestra, together with Wuhan soprano Zhang Liping and baritone He Leiming.

Wuhan is where Covid-19 started. China now claims to be Covid-free while much of the rest of the world is locked down.

“‘Dedicated to 2020’ is the first large-scale (symphony) work paying tribute to the fight against the coronavirus epidemic,'” said the conductor Yu Long, chairman of the Beijing Music Festival Art Committee.

Here’s more.

The Lebanese-Armenian Kevork Hadjian has been killed in the Nagorno-Karabakh war. He was 49.

A foreign volunteer in the Armenian Revolutionary Federation platoon, he was killed on Tuesday in the Varangatagh sector.

Raised in the Bekaa valley, Hadjian completed his musical training in Armenia and made his name singing nationalist songs to the Armenian diaspora in several European countries.