You see it here first.

The other one’s Alison Krauss.

A stunning video of Purcell’s piece from Theater Aachen:

Theater Aachen says: Music for a While by Henry Purcell. A piece whose title fits well at this time because after a little over two months we had to close our gates again with the 2. lockdown ′′ light ′′ heavy heart. But we’re confident that we’ll be able to play for you again soon! And most of all: Theatre and music as balm for the soul is so important especially in such times! So here’s some music for you from the singers from the ensemble of the Theater Aachen! Have fun & see you very soon, because behind the scenes we continue to rehearse!!

Photo; Wil van Iersel

A video report just in: The Israel Opera has dismissed 53 members of its chorus.

Dismissal letters were received today.

‘I’m in shock,’ says one singer.

Zach Granit, the opera’s CEO, said ‘it’s the hardest decision of my life: to have a season without chorus.’

Some things work well in Vienna.

We hear that the the Auner Quartet has been loaned two violins by the National Bank of Austria. One is a Giovanni Grancino cello (Milan 1706). The other is the Antonio Stradivari violin (‘ex Rouse-Boughton’), Cremona 1698.

This is it, played by Barbara Auner.

In addition to suspending the December 7 opening of the opera season, the theatre has called off all concerts of the Filarmonica della Scala until the end of February 2021.

Covid rates are spiralling once more in northern Italy.

Corriere della Serra has pblished a protest letter by the orchestra’s principal viola, Daniele Rossi:

…I’m too old to keep quiet, after 35 years of Scala and 40 of concerts around the world. All those high-level conductors who were expected at La Scala are going to Rai. Luisi, Harding, Gatti! And with us nothing. The same for the Filarmonica della Scala: nothingness. And nobody says anything! Then they make you a big concert on December 7th so we are all happy and then close everything again! I’m too old to keep quiet, after 35 years of Scala and 40 of concerts around the world.

The trial opened in Munich this morning of Hans-Jürgen von Bose, 66, well-known composer and former professor at the music academy. He denied all charges.

From a report in Bild:

The Munich public prosecutor’s office accuses him of triple rape of an ex-partner (36) in 2006 and 2007. This is the second sex scandal surrounding the renowned music academy, following the trials against ex-president Siegfried Mauser (66).

Looking back: in April 2015, SEK officers stormed the Munich flat of Hans-Jürgen von B. His ex-partner had reported him and declared that he had weapons in the house. The investigators found cocaine and other narcotics as well as drugs, a gas pistol – and a student (26) of the professor in the basement. She offered resistance.

They also found a kind of timetable, which she apparently had to follow. According to the investigation files it is meticulously listed: When she should clean the house, when she can go to university, when she should have sex with B. and other men. Apparently, the student had subordinated herself to the professor as a kind of sex slave.

…Just under ten years earlier, in 2006, B. met his ex-partner, who now accuses him of rape. She is the sister of a student whom B. was mentoring at the time. They got closer, and it quickly became bizarre. According to the indictment, B. is said to have forced the young woman, who now lectures at a university, to stay awake by injecting her with cocaine. These accusations are now at issue in the trial at the Munich Regional Court.

… At the trial on Friday, Hans-Jürgen von B. spoke out on the accusations, denying having raped his ex-partner. On the fringes of the trial, he also explained to BILD: ‘The sex was always consensual.’ He had also denied the assaults to the police.

He had had a love affair with the woman. The sex was to ‘very special tastes’. He was basically shocked by the accusations, as his ex-partner had wanted to move into a house with him and start a family.

The celebrity actor, broadcaster and Trump imitator Alec Baldwin has resigned from WNYC after being ordered to grill Woody Allen over allegations of sexual misconduct that he has long denied.

Baldwin, who has appeared in three of Allen’s films and is a regular presenter for the New York Philharmonic, has hosted Here’s the Thing on WNYC since 2011. He is moving the show to iHeartRadio from January.

He told Billboard: ‘Once WNYC said, ‘We won’t air the interview unless you ask these questions’ and forced that editorial content on me like that, I knew I was out of there…. That might be the only criticism of NYC that I have. I’m not saying to people to turn their backs on them or not support them. This is an experience that I had that was a singular experience which I thought was handled very badly by them. Having said that, I think there is still a lot of good there.’

Singers tell us that rehearsals for the Opéra de Paris Ring cycle have been called off after cast members tested positive for Covid-19.

The intention is to resume rehearsals in a week, givign just enough time for a premiere at the end of the month.

There has been no statement from the OdP. All we have is this:

We hope to be able to record and broadcast Richard Wagner’s Ring cycle by the end of November. We are also looking into the possibility of adapting the scheduling of this cycle at the Radio France Auditorium, at the beginning of December.

The bass-baritone Thomas Hammons who sang more than 250 times at the Metropolitan Opera, has died suddenly at 68, leaving a grieving widow and twin daughters.

A first-choice casting for John Adams opera, he created the role of Henry Kissinger in the world premiere of Nixon in China in 1987 at Houston Grand Opera and performed the role in many other houses. He played the terrorist Rambo in Adams’s Death of Klinghoffer at its Brussels world premiere and featured on the Nonesuch recordings of both works.

Elsewhere, he was a chilling Sacristan in Tosca.

At Cincinnati Opera in 2016 he had a heart attack backstage after rehearsal. A stagehand gave him emergency resuscitation and an extra, who happened to be a surgeon, looked after him until an ambulance arrived. He made a good recovery and enjoyed a full career.

The Quatuor Manfred, founded in 1986, has called it a day after its Beethoven recitals were called off during Covid.

Based in Dijon, its members were Marie Béreau and Luigi Vecchioni, violina, Emmanuel Haratyk, viola, and Christian Wolff, cello.

The ever-reliable Moritz Eggert, president of the German Composers’ Association, has criticised ‘hysterical screams’ from performing artists, along with demands for increased financial support during the pandemic.

‘I am getting by to a certain extent and find it disagreeable to beg for money now when others need it more urgently,’ he said.

Helmets on.

The tenor Rolando Villazon is claiming a giant coup for Salzburg Mozart Week 2021, if which he is artistic director.

Around Mozart’s birthday at the end of January he will present for performance an unheard piano piece by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozarts, in three parts and with a dance-like character.

The pianist will be Roert Levin.

The whole piece lasts 94 seconds.  ‘Not long,’ says Villazon, ‘but with Mozart it is a whole cosmos.’

As you were.