All fall out at Covent Garden
NewsThe Maltese tenor Joseph Calleja has withdrawn from all performances of a rare revival of Verdi’s Attila, due to illness. He is replaced by the Romanian Stefan Pop. The rest of the cast is still standing: Ildar Abdrazakov in the title role, María José Siri as Odabella and Simon Keenlyside as the Roman General Ezio.
Can ‘n’ Pag, meanwhile, continues to be decimated.
Fabio Sartori withdrew from last night’s Pagliacci with Covid. Aigul Akhmetshina has is out of Cavalleria rusticana for the same reason.
Will this virus never end?
Abdrazakov has neve said anything against war but he can still singing everywhere.
Not really because this is his first appearance in the West since the outbreak of war – until now he has canceled everything there. Maybe a change in Kremlin strategy – because he belongs, like Gergiev, Netrebkos, Gerzmava and some others to the small group of Kremlin favorites.
Covid won’t end as long as we do nothing to contain its spread.
Containing its spread does absolutely nothing to make it end, it just suppresses it. None of the countries that adopted zero covid strategies managed to make it end. China continues to try, and fail.
It will only end when the virus naturally runs out of road, as was the case with every pandemic in history.
We have done all that and it doesn’t work. All it does is surpress it, and bides a bit of time, certainly in Britain, so as not to overwhelm the national health service. People still have strokes, heart attacks and cancers, and terrible mental illnesses from social isolation et al, including the staff. But the virus is here for a long time yet.
They just can’t sing it, covid is the perfect excuse.
They sang Cav & Pag extremely well last Thursday as I was there, and multiple replacements yet sang with big generous hearts too.
Calleja was very audibly struggling in La Gioconda at West Horsley on Wednesday night. It’s clear that he’s not well; this is wholly understandable.
I don’t see anywhere in the article that Calleja has Covid (although that could very well be true)…there still are other illnesses out there (at least from what I’ve been told).
Hard to believe there was no Maltese tenor on tap to jump in.
Well, at least it is to people like Norman who believes there was no UK tenor available to replace Freddie de Tomasso based simply on the fact that a singer from a different country was engaged to sing tonight’s Verdi Requiem at the Proms.
There was a time when being the best available singer was the sole criterion, regardless of nationality.
What, at the Proms?
Aigul Akhmetshina is currently only out of 1 performance- 17 July. Of course, the casting could change again.
On another note, get well soon Joseph Calleja! Disappointed for him as well as us- I hope it wasn’t England that infected him (with Covid or something else) although it probably was….as Covid cases in England are shooting up even among the vaccinated.
Freddie de Tommaso also had to withdraw from the prestigious First Night of the Proms (live tv broadcast and international broadcast/streaming and all) and he’s stated himself it was due to (2nd bout of) Covid.
Get well soon, Joseph, Freddie and everyone else afflicted.
I’ve been surprised to read of the many singers and conductors dropping out of European and UK performances because of covid. In June you know how many covid cancellations there were at SF Opera? Zero. This despite a steep rise of Covid in the SF area. Looks like mask mandates (and probably vaccination mandates) at SF Opera work. And that article about 1/4 of concertgoers saying they won’t return? If I wasn’t convinced that the venue were doing everything possible to keep audiences and performers safe, I wouldn’t go back either.