Why is Valery Gergiev’s favourite mezzo singing at the Met
NewsNext week, the Metropolitan Opera will revive Rigoletto with a new cast that includes Erin Morley, Quinn Kelsey, Yulia Matochkina and Stephen Costello.
Matochkina, who is making her Met debut, is a cast member of the Mariinsky Theatre and a particular favourite of its Putin-puppet boss, Valery Gergiev.
So why is she singing at the Met?
Perhaps Gelb simply overlooked her in his political and ethnic cleansing?
Chicago Symphony Orchestra hears her too next month as Ulrica for Muti.
What kind of slur is that? If you have something worth hearing, SAY it.
“Ethnic cleansing” is what Milosevic did in the former Yugoslavia during the 1990s, until he was stopped in Kosovo. And he did it with support from Russia. Several millions were forced to flee, and tens of thousands were murdered.
Not hiring a singer or a conductor is not quite the same thing. Too bad you can’t see the difference.
@Hugo
How true. To lump together the not hiring of someone, with ethnic cleansing of entire populations, is an insult to real victims of ethnic cleansing. I wonder why does this site attract so many commenters who either use words they don’t understand, are given to unhinged hyperbole, lie through their teeth, or need medical therapy. Cast your mind back to Stalin, Hitler, and a few other major deranged politicians, Achim, for ethnic cleansing. Peter Gelb, for all his other faults, doesn’t qualify even for the first round, never mind for the ‘award.’
Artistic merit?
The only ‘artistic merit’ the Met’s current Rigoletto production asks from Maddalena is of the Isola Jones variety, though someone less endowed would do too.
So now cast members of Russian opera houses should be banned ? Because they’re alleged to be so-and-so’s “favorite” ? Stop the witch hunt. Matochkina is a wonderful singer, no wonder Gergiev likes her.
Yes. All Russian artists should get out. We have plentiful artists here who aren’t heard widely enough and more than enough to fill all roles, all concertos, etc. Russian artists literally can just get the hell out. No need to whine about witch hunts, just skip to an all out, straight up ban. And when they get around to banning / expelling Russians in general, I’m ok with that too. Open season.
Unless this is a joke, I hope at least some commenters here realize how racist this post sounds. Banishing artists based on their national origin? This is how the Jews were cast out in the 1930s…
Also, if “we have plentiful artists here who aren’t heard widely enough” , why not ban all foreign artists to promote the underrepresented local talent? Think big…
Did you make the same case for American musicians who didn’t take strong public stances against the USA’s various imperialistic misadventures? I’m guessing not
@BP, stop the unhinged hyperbole, nobody is hunting any witches. I wonder how many of you keyboard warriors would know the voice of this ‘wonderful singer’ if you were to just hear it among dozens of other generic voices exhibiting the same deficiencies? Don’t make me upload a sample to test you, so we can all see you running away with the tail between your legs.
While I _absolutely_ don’t agree with the tone of @Yeah they should’s comment, he wrote one truth, the elephant-in-the-room truth. Opera business is overpopulated with generic singers exhibiting the same deficiencies. Plenty of them to choose from, no need to import anyone, particularly for comprimari roles. This is the truth all of you making noise here are afraid from, afraid people would stumble upon it, if they’d stop to think just a little. Badly done, Peter Gelb. Stop doing business with certain agents, and stop hiring certain singers just because they’re cheap.
Singing there because she can perhaps – er – sing?
Perhaps – er – not.
Perhaps – er – it’s her twin accomplishments.
The production requires this type of accomplishment.
It’s not about Gergiev. It’s about Putin.
So? She is not his paramour. She is a favorite singer or Gergiev who has been canceled. How many ‘degrees of separation’ does this cleansing reach? If even putting pressure on oligarchs doesn’t make a dent in Putin’s tactics, what do you expect a soprano to do?
Any payment she earns goes back to Russia with her, and improves Putin’s economy. Stripping Russia’s economy bare is one way of stopping his evil madness.
Maybe she hasn’t been an in-your-face Putinista like Netrebko.
Hilarious! “Putinista!”
I thought his favourite mezzo was Borodina.
As she was for many. Borodina was a goddess in her prime.
After Yuliya Matochkina won the Tchaikovsky Competition in 2015, her career at the Mariinsky was carefully developed, first small roles, now the big roles of the mezzosoprano repertoire. Recently she sang at La Scala Ulrica.
Answering your question, why she is singing at the MET, is quite easy : because she is good enough being invited. In former times Gergiev took HIS Mariinsky singers with him to the MET. Now Matochkina is invited independent from Gergiev, and she deserves it 100 %.
Should all Mariinsky singers banned from singing outside Russia for one single reason, because they are member of a company run by Putin friend Gergiev? That’s witch hunt or even more, “Sippenhaft” = collective punishment.
“because she is good enough being invited.”
Or because she is well endowed enough to be invited. The only accomplishment the Met’s current Rigoletto production asks from Maddalena, for all practical purposes a comprimario role, is still very much related to the kind of twin accomplishments Isola Jones made such a hit with back in the day.
It gets boring.You sound like a parrot,repeating the same bull again and again.We already got the first time you dislike the production
Take your antidepressants and all will be good. Whoever has the care of you shouldn’t allow you internet access when your paranoia is at its peak. Chrissake, posting online ain’t therapy. No, you didn’t got it I dislike the production because I never commented on it, nor do I remember Norman posting anything about _this_ production.
P.S. If you don’t want people refer to your condition, stop advertising it yourself on this site.
If you didn’t get it my comments here make fun of the _Dexter_ production, you’ll have to work harder or postpone work altogether until you are in a less excitable state.
Further info:
https://operawire.com/mariinsky-theatre-mezzo-to-perform-at-metropolitan-opera-after-showing-support-for-gergiev/
Matochkina congratulated Gergiev on his birthday? Shame on her! Didn’t she know that by doing so she was supporting Putin’s war? OMG!
BTW – for conductor Gavriel Heine, an USA citizen, it was easier to say No to Putin and resign from the Mariinsky than for an artist, who lives in Russia and has family there.
My two cents: People from the US do not realize that every single Opera House in Russia is state owned (in many cases one of the perks of being on the payroll of each theatre is to have a decent flat which many times is owned by the theatre, you are entitled to live in it as long as you are that company’s member.), Not like the US, where all Opera Houses are private entities and do not get any money from the government for their payrolls. I do agree with Gelb’s decision to cut ties with Netrebko, Gerzmava, Gergiev, Garifulina who donated money to Putin’s cause in the past, or in public supported his war in Ukraine, or previous invasion of Georgia. There are many others who are company members in other Russian theaters and do sing at the MET like Abdrazakov, Schementchuk, O. Petrova, Diadkova, Zaremba, Antipenko, Golovatenko, Burdenko, Bodganov, Tsymbaliuk, Svetlov, Volkova, Paster etc. Does that mean if they show up as company members of different Russian owned Opera Houses to perform their contracted duties of performances in order to get a monthly salary and keep their homes and food on the table, that they support Putin’s war? If you scan their public profiles on the web, you do not find any political statements from them. In the above case of Matochkina, she is artistically a major protegee of Gergiev for a decade, as was for example Djadkova in the past; if those wish him happy birthday that is not a political statement… Also, a very tricky question: If any of them get scheduled as a company member to perform a concert in presence of Putin by their Artistic Director/or conductor, do you truly think they can refuse without fear of being fired? There are many others, who support Putin’s war publicly and had not been removed yet from engagements in the West like: Vasilij Lyadiuk, Vasilij Gerello, Evgenij Nikitin, Augunda Kulaeva, Alexander Tatarintsev etc.; or Yusif Eyvazov (alias Mr. Netrebko) who openly refuses to sing with any Armenian singer? Let’s not go crazy on each Russian singer fulfilling their contract duties at their Russian State-owned Opera Houses in order to be paid, fed and have a roof over their heads. Each case is very sensitive, tricky and depends on their own actions in the past, or present in the public media.
If by “Tsymbaliuk” you mean Alexander Tsymbalyuk, he is Ukranian.
Ignoto, where is the proof of Evgeny Nikitin supporting Putin’s war publicly? I remember that he was accused of doing so by another online blog, because he was singing at the Mariinsky on “Victory Day” the title role in “Prince Igor”. That means, everyone who wants to avoid the impression of being Putin’s pet, should not sing especially on “Victory Day”.
You mentioned quite right, that all Russian opera houses are owned by the state, are run by Putin’s money. Does that mean, that all members of a Russian opera company are supporting Putin and his war?
When Kirill Petrenko recently conducted “Iolanta” and “Pikovaya Dama” in Berlin and Baden-Baden, he obviously did not mind, that 4 Mariinsky singers were in the cast : Stikhina, Denisova, Akimov, Sulimsky. Mariinsky = Gergiev = Putin!!!???
Came across this thread and your comment, and wanted to offer a slight correction… Bogdanov is American, Ukrainian born. He has never been to Russia, never belonged to any Russian house, and has never sung in Russia or anywhere adjacent (except for Teatr Wielki). He was born in Odessa (Soviet Union at the time) and moved to California as a child in 1992. He has also publicly shared his disgust with the war and its propagators.
But your point is well taken… how can an artist or anyone else be forced to choose sides when their entire livelihood depends on it?
It takes a lot of courage to publicly say and do something, and saying/doing nothing comes from a place of fear and powerlessness rather than apathy or callousness.
Oh, what poor Putin’s henchmen! let’s feel sorry for them! Maybe you will regret the 30,000 killed in Mariupol !!!???
What a mess the world has turned into.
A mess we have to thank Putin for. Peter Gelb, for all his various small faults, hasn’t turned the world into a mess. Mess is when thousands of people die for no fault of their own, when millions of people are made to leave their country for not fault of their own, when many more other millions pay for the war on one side, and others for the upkeep of refugees on the other side, and will pay much more to make the pile of debris which is Ukraine now, habitable again. World mess ain’t when a singer gets or doesn’t get a role.
The fact that Gergiev likes her and/or her singing does not necessarily mean that she likes everything he does and it certainly does not mean that she supports everything Putin does. Canceling her on just that rather flimsy basis would be excessively harsh and definitely unjustified.
Leaving Putin & politics aside, why the heck the Met needs to fly in a Mariinsky singer for the smallish role of Maddalena ? This should be an occasion for local talent to grow by appearing on the big stage.
Correct. Why the heck? My supposition is because Peter Gelb does business with certain agents who push cheap singers.
I heard that a third cousin of his works in the wardrobe shop. FIRE HER! And that guy who presses his tails when he was there! FIRE HIM TOO!
She has a real voice, a contract, and knows not to praise Putin — or even has a conscience and a heart?
Because she is very good and not every institution is into cancel culture.
I have heard Yuliya Matochkina many times, at Valery Gergiev’s festivals in Rotterdam and Mikkeli and more often at the Mariinsky. I can assure you, she is very, very good and is replacing there Olga Borodina in a time, when this great artist sings less and less and is concentrating on few roles like Marfa and the Countess in Pikovaya Dama.
Of course you can ask, why the MET casts her in a relatively small role like Maddalena, which she has not sung at the Mariinsky before. The answer could be that Matochkina with the help of her agency started only recently a career outside the Mariinsky with upcoming appearances like Eboli at Covent Garden. Maybe be it is for the MET of less risk of giving her first Maddalena and (hopefully) later roles like Dalila, Marfa, Amneris, Eboli etc. Matochkina deserves it.
Note, there is at the Mariinsky another very good mezzosoprano in Borodina’s footsteps – Ekaterina Sergeyeva. Watch this name!
This sends mixed messages to the Met public. If Netrebko is banned, then why are certain Russian singers allowed if they are still singing in St. Petersburg in a state sponsored house? In a small role such as Magdelana, why not hire someone from the Met’s young artist program? And for my 2 cents, the new Rigoletto production is dreadful.
Met’s mission statement affirms the following: “The mission of the Metropolitan Opera Guild is to enrich people’s lives through an awareness and deeper appreciation of opera while supporting the Metropolitan Opera by expanding its reach to diverse communities and a wider audience.”.
https://www.metguild.org/MOG/About_The_Guild/About_the_Guild.html?TM=111
I don’t see anything about sending any other messages to the Met public (except for the ones contained, in this particular case, in Verdi’s “Rigoletto”).
Hi! You are missing the point that in the entire Russia all Opera Houses are state run, singer receive monthly salaries etc from the Russian State Minister of Culture payrolls. So it is legally and morally irrelevant if a singer performs at the Marinsky, Bolshoi, or Yekaterinburg or any other one. By that logic you would have to ban all singers from Russia from engagements in the West (people in the US forget also that not all company members in ANY Russian State owned and operated Opera House are Russian born. If a singer did not make a political statement like Netrebko, Gerzmava, Garifulina or Gergjev in the media or public, they should not be banned. Also if they have to sing under Gergjev; that’s not a political statement but their obligation under their company contract to get a monthly salary. I been for 45 years Artistic Director (not Russian or any of those), have zero interest who is hired at the MET, but have wast experience of hiring Eastern European Opera singers. Why the did not hire for Maddalena a young Artist program member, because 99% of the time it is casted with major singers.
“Why the did not hire for Maddalena a young Artist program member, because 99% of the time it is casted with major singers.”
@Ignoto, the above is 99% incorrect. I give you the benefit of doubt and believe your comment shows just ignorance of Met casts (if so I wonder why you comment here with such confidence), but considering what’s going on this site, I am sorely tempted to believe you lied through your teeth. I am however not prone of succumbing to temptations and will, as already mentioned, give you the benefit of doubt.
This is the list of Met’s Maddalenas of the last 40 years. It contains the Met’s Japan tour, which explains one name. I might have a missed a name or two, though I don’t believe so.
Barbara Conrad
Cleopatra Ciurca
Isola Jones
Sandra Walker
Wendy White
Birgitta Svendén
Victoria Livengood
Robynne Redmon
Graciela Araya
Irina Mishura
Denyce Graves
Mzia Nioradze
Marina Domashenko
Nancy Fabiola Herrera
Kate Aldrich
Viktoria Vizin
Nino Surguladze
Kirstin Chávez
Oksana Volkova
Katarina Leoson
Ramona Zaharia
Varduhi Abrahamyan
Yulia Matochkina
In what alternate universe, Ignoto, are the above major singers?
As to Russian opera houses being state run, we all know this. These singers all have cushy careers in Russia. What people wonder about is why do these singers feel entitled to have it both ways? Why are they self-proclaiming themselves above the rest of the population? The rest of the European population pays for this war – some with their lives, others with their livelihood, others with their possessions, others with their wallet. Russians singers and instrument players, and their supporters of which this site is teeming with, have them self-proclaimed above such concerns. (And please note it’s just Russians whining about Western gigs, non-Russians singers and instrument players don’t whine about their lost Russian gigs.) So, er, why? Why should the rest of the population buy into this fad? Don’t tell me it’s because artists are above such petty concerns. First, such concerns aren’t petty, secondly, no everybody who sings or plays an instrument is an artist. For many, many or them their performances are just another day at the office. Don’t make me upload a soundtrack with a bunch of mezzos to test your ear, lets see if Matochkina’s ‘artistry’ will jump at you from your speakers. Not even her vocal shortcomings will jump at you, plenty of generic singers exhibiting the same.
It is amazing that supporting singers or instrument players, regardless of their national/ ethnic origin, may be brought up in a negative connotation. In my opinion, this is as noble a viewpoint as they come. Please, dear Guest, look at the far-reaching consequences of “collective punishment” (for any reason) exhibited through the human history time and again. You will see that ultimately, the bell tolled for those who were initially cheering such bans. Once you set the precedent… one day, it is YOUR compatriots who may be banished, simply because they live and work where they do.
Please, deer Pianist, stop inflating the issue. There is no such thing like ‘collective punishment’ in this case. To compare the hiring or non-hiring of a singer by an opera house with ‘collective punishment exhibited through human history time and again’ is an insult to the cases of real collective punishment. What Stalin did, what Hitler did, what Mao did, what a few other egomaniacs with absolute political power did, what Putin is about to do – these are cases of collective punishment, affecting millions of people, many of them paying with their lives. Peter Gelb hiring or not hiring a singer who is financially well off and/or gets gigs elsewhere, is so far from ‘collective punishment’ that I wonder what have certain people drunk or smoked before commenting here. There’s plenty of generic, mediocre opera singers to chose from, and houses can’t ‘support’ all of them. Funny how before the war nobody was getting their panties in a knot at Russian houses hiring only Russian comprimari, yet now, all of a sudden, it is Peter Gelb’s saintly duty to hire non-American (read Russian) comprimari for the Met? Do you realize how ludicrous this claim sounds? Did Putin put something in the tap water over there or what’s going on, why this brazen entitlement, why this total lack of common sense?
‘You will see that ultimately, the bell tolled for those who were initially cheering such bans.’ The bell didn’t toll for those cheering the bans, the bell always tolls for those who either lose a war, or dare to oppose potentates regardless of war outcome, openly and systematically for a longer period of time. If you need an example for the latter, refresh your history knowledge with what Stalin did. Please spare me the trope of present Russians fearing for their lives. If they are afraid, they shouldn’t oppose Putin, which, as far as I can tell, is exactly what they do, and are rewarded accordingly. I have no quibbles with their behavior, no one is entitled to ask heroics from other people. But I have a quibble with the brazen entitlement exhibited by keyboard warriors on this site, that it is the Met’s sacred duty to hire mediocre Russians for _any_ roles, particularly for comprimari, when the business is teeming with mediocre, generic singers of all nationalities to chose from, and this includes the Americans Peter Gelb has in his backyard so to speak.
‘one day, it is YOUR compatriots who may be banished’ Is this a threat? Why am I not surprised?
Dear Guest, I completely understand the need to channel the fear, frustration, anxiety caused by Covid and economic downturn into hatred towards someone. Preferably a group of people. And what can be better than the most fashionable enemy at the moment? “Mediocre Russian singers” ! “Brazen entitlement”! “Hitler and Stalin”! I don’t know who is inflating the issue, if there is any. 🙂 I hope you feel better soon. Meanwhile, Italy and Switzerland, along with the Met, will be soon applauding the mediocre Matochkina. Apparently, the haven’t had the chance to have you vet her.
https://www.music-opera.com/en/artistes/39414-yulia-matochkina.html
Take care of yourself, please.
Dear Guest, one more thing I would like to note before bowing out. You have flooded this thread with multiple references to Matochkina’s “mediocrity”. “Repeat a lie often enough and it becomes the truth”, as one notorious political figure used to say. Thank goodness hiring decisions are still, at least partially, made by experts in the field.
Dear Pianist.
You are the only one here (and your trolling buddies) who keeps repeating the mantra of fear and whatnot like a broken recording. We all know Russian propaganda when we see it, nothing new under the sun, and rather boring. Perhaps you should apply that quote to yourself. As to Matochkina’s ‘wonderful singing’ as advertised by you and your buddies, I have challenged you guys to identify her among others. You all pretend you haven’t seen that. Rotflol.
The casting decisions aren’t made by opera experts, Pianist. The casting decisions are made by people who look at spreadsheets. Rule #1 in business, comprimari gotta be cheap.
Unfortunately you can’t keep your promise of bowing out. You bowed out here and popped up somewhere else on SD. Dear Pianist, shouldn’t you better channel your energies into practicing the piano? Or are you so good you don’t need practicing? If so, where can we hear you playing? Those ‘experts in the field’ you mentioned must be literally beating down your door. Before you attempt to ape me and throw the last back at me, remember you don’t know anything about me. I suppose you will change your moniker now, LOL. The Russian trolls factory working to capacity, and about as effective as their army, as someone else said.
Dear guest, using the same moniker, I would like to assure you that I shall be “popping up” every now and then –to keep this site from turning into a predictably Russophobic echo chamber, ya know. 🙂
Says he bows out and here he is, less 24 hours later ️️️ Still not feeling like telling us who you are so we may assess your proficiency as piano player? Still not feeling like entering that little challenge of mine, so we can assess your opera knowledge? If you know anything about music, instrumental or vocal, I’m the pope, LOL. More like troll model XWZ1M, from Putin’s troll factory, paid by the word. To judge from your post, Putin’s propaganda office pays best for the word ‘Russophobic’ ️. ‘Witch hunt’ is dispensable. But nice to see you have dropped all musical pretensions and told us directly you are here to agitate the political waters.
I wouldn’t put it past you to come back a third time, swearing all the time you are going to bow out. Your buddy Ignoto at least stood to his word.
Thank you for replies. I am aware that many of the singers I mentioned are not “Russian born” even if for example Paster and Tsymbalyuk are born on the territory of Ukraine, but when they were born before 1991 it was Sovetskij Sojuz. My point is, unfortunately many Americans do not know the difference when singers are comming to the US from the Bolshoi or Marinsky Theather (I know it because I used to be a Director of Opera (now retired) and hired many Eastern European singers of the past and such I am familiar with how the Russian Opera owned Theaters function. I did not go into details where each example name comes from, or to which local Opera House that singer belongs (like Volkova to Belarus), otherwise my comments would been a mile long :).
Well Ignoto, Americans, like everybody else on planet Earth (with perhaps the exception of Russians, if Putin has blocked their internet access in earnest), are just three clicks away from finding out where singers come from, read where they use to sing. This is what it takes, Ignoto – typing an URL, click, type the singer’s name, click, scroll, click. I wonder how come you don’t know this. The list is sometimes incomplete, but most of the time it’s accurate enough.
Dear “Guest”; let me clarify few things and you can double check them with the Archives of the MET, which is available few clicks away to anyone who can browse the web. 1) Until today the MET performed 907 performances of Rigoletto. From the start at 1883 Maddalena was cast with established singers as Homer or Castagna. From 1940 mostly by young promising singers like Madeira, R.Elias, M.Dunn, F.von Stade, J.Forst who later became major stars; or established secondary comprimario artists like M.Lipton, M.Roggero, Glatz, Casei, Grillo, S.Love, I.Jones; or imports like Baldani or Cernei when singing at the same time period roles like Carmen, or Amneris. 2) The MET’s young artist program was established in 1980 and from the entire names list, you mentioned above, only a single name is a MET’s young artist program member and another of them a member of a different young artists program of a different US opera house. The rest of them are either another major artists singing at the same time other leading roles at the MET; or where imported from other opera houses around the globe and even two of them also former protegee’s of Gergjev. 3) You have not protested those in the past, so why are you suddenly picking up only on the third artistic protegee of Gergjev being casted in the same role??? Based on your logic many other current singers on the MET’s roster should be removed because they knew about abuse going on with a different issue (but morally as appalling Putin’s political cause and war), but because they are singers who wanted to sing, they all kept their mouth shut. Your suggestion of using a young Artist program does not correspond with MET’s history how they cast the role, it is their pejorative who they cast and not mine, or yours. You are obviously trying to publicly bash Matochkina without serious proof of any wrong political doing on her behalf. Please stop your Russian political witch hunt. The MET has plenty of talented employees who monitor this current problem and until you have a real proof stop, or otherwise one day a wealthy singer may go after you, if you deliberately try to damage their international career. You are on a very thin ice here, not because of your casting ideas, but your deliberate bashing of this artist which looks very personal to me. (For full disclosure I am not Russian, or any other former Russian states citizen, I’ve never met Matochkina and have zero personal interest/or profit, if she sings at the MET, or any other Opera House around the globe.
Dear Ignoto.
The ‘Reply to’ button not working for you, or do you have trouble locating it? Please use it when answering other people’s posts, instead of writing stand-alone comments. I understand writing a standalone comment when you are replying to several people at once (and even this is debatable practice), but not when you are replying to just one person.
1. Where do you think I got the comprehensive list of singers I published in my previous comment, if not from the Met archives? From my crystal ball? But nice to see you have discovered the archives for yourself, with or without intelligence service help. Perhaps if you exert yourself a little more, you may discover the other source too I alluded in my other comment.
2. The point of my ‘Maddalena’ post was your claim ‘99% of the time it is casted with major singers’, not the Met’s Young Artists’ program. Mister New York was the guy who mentioned the Met’s Young Artists program, not I. I quoted your complete sentence but surely you realized I didn’t comment anything about the first half of it – if you bothered to read my comment before replying. I’m not so sure you did, given the content of your reply. This is what you wrote about my reply to you ‘Your suggestion of using a young Artist program does not correspond with MET’s history how they cast the role’. Hello? Earth to Ignoto? I am not Mister New York.
3. Repeating myself, if you consider the singers I posted to be ‘major singers’, you are inhabiting a different universe from the rest of us. As to who sang the role in 1883, nobody cares, get real. Nobody cares who sang Maddalena before the second world war either. But nice to see that the ‘major singers’ of your first comment were discretely downgraded to ‘young promising singers’ in your reply above.
4. Quote: ‘You have not protested those in the past, so why are you suddenly picking up only on the third artistic protegee of Gergjev being casted in the same role??? Based on your logic many other current singers on the MET’s roster should be removed because they knew about abuse going on with a different issue…’
I hope you use ‘you’ in the impersonal in your comment; please remember you don’t know me. If you are using ‘you’ in the impersonal as you should, I wonder why you wrote the question quote above in a comment directed to _me_ ? Did I mention Gergiev anywhere in my comments? Did I mention abuse and whatnot? Hello? Earth to Ignoto? Hello?
As to ‘ _people_ not protesting those in the past’ , in the meantime there’s a war going on, Ignoto, even if Putin forbids you to call it such. Perhaps this might be a reason? If you are familiar with the Met’s history beside the few names you have hastily extracted from the archives yesterday, you may remember the consequences of the Depression and the WW2. Give my suggestion a thought, Ignoto, but to be sure, ask those _people_ why they didn’t protest in the past. Don’t ask _me_ , I am not their public speaker, whoever they may be.
5. Quote: ‘You are obviously trying to publicly bash Matochkina without serious proof of any wrong _political_ doing on her behalf. Please stop your Russian _political_ witch hunt. You are obviously trying to publicly bash Matochkina without serious proof of any wrong _political_ doing on her behalf.’
Political witch hunt? Where? I even wrote ‘no one is entitled to ask heroics from other people’. Earth to Ignoto? Hello? Hello? Helloooooooo?
6. Quote: ‘otherwise one day a wealthy singer may go after you, if you deliberately try to damage their international career. You are on a very thin ice here, not because of your casting ideas, but your deliberate bashing of this artist which looks very personal to me.’
Okay Ignoto, now I’m sure you are a Russian troll, and Pianist is another, same veiled threats to non-existing political bashing. The more you deny your trolling, the more like trolling it looks. Go away and don’t forget to take your buddies with you, who all peddle the ‘witch hunt’ expression. Is this the latest prescription of Putin’s propaganda office?
P.S. Quote: ‘The MET has plenty of talented employees who monitor this current problem… it is their pejorative who they cast and not mine, or yours.’
Chrissake, Ignoto, learn English, don’t ask the spell checker to do the thinking for you, otherwise those people may come after you and your fate might be exactly the one you so charmingly threatened me with in your comment.
Dear “Guest” I have more important things in life to do as to reply to your incoherent rants. Have a nice life and stop bashing Opera singers for political reasons. FYI I have 45 years under my belt as Artistic Director with major Opera House around the globe. I will not reply to any of you further rants…..
Dear Ignoto.
Thank heaven you have seen the embarrassment of digging yourself a deeper ‘argumentative’ hole than what we have witnessed until now, and have decided to bow out. I hope you can keep to your word and refrain from popping up elsewhere on this site. Your alter the ‘Pianist’ couldn’t stick to his word longer than 24 hours.