Just in: Vienna Opera surrenders to Anna Netrebko
NewsThe Vienna State Opera, desperate to sell more than half its seats, has just confirmed that Anna Netrebko will open its season in La Bohème.
She had been banned by most houses for the last six months over her past support for Vladimir Putin’s military aggression in Ukraine.
Netrebko will be joined as Rodolfo by the Italian tenor Vittorio Grigolo, who has been banned indefinitely by Covent Garden and the Met for acts of sexual aggression.
The Vienna State Opera under Bogdan Roscic’s management is turning into a veritable rogues’ gallery.
UPDATE: The Staatsopera has asked us to clarify: Anna Netrebko was not banned by the Wiener Staatsoper. Like in most other houses, after she had stated her position on the war in Ukraine, we received press inquiries and made our position clear in turn. This happened in April and is public record, we announced her performances in the upcoming revival of “Aida” (performances in January 2023).
picture: Anna Netrebko as Mimì at Vienna Staatsoper © Wiener Staatsoper / Barbara Zeininger
It’s even worse than that. Since her husband Yousef Ayvazov can not sing the lead tenor role (and because the role requires a singer who doesn’t sound like a drunken goat), she has instead arranged for Eyvazov to conduct all performances.
(Just joking folks – but how far into the future will it be before this isn’t a joke?)
Your drunken goat comment, whilst amusing, applies equally to all the other roles that Herr Netrebko has been given to sing over the years. In what way is Rodolfo different?
I can’t take credit for the “drunken goat” line – someone else on here used it (don’t recall exactly, but he/she deserves an award), and it was nothing short of a spot-on, brilliant description.
Typical Roscic.
He gives the requisite lip service that the goal of the Vienna State opera is to present art on the highest level.
Then, however, when the production that was scheduled, presumably for artistic reasons, cannot be presented with the originally intended cast, rather than take an artistic risk and cast some unknown talent, he does whatever he can do bring butts into seats.
He says that it is impossible to find replacements on such short notice: did he have no covers lined up? Usually in a large repertory house like the Vienna State opera, the ensemble members cover the principal guest artists. If I were an ensemble singer in Vienna, I would feel verascht.
So we call Vienna a Oblast of Russia and this without a so called referendum.
Exactly!
Let’s not the enthusiastic support for the Anslusch to Nazi Germany in 1938…
Alagna and Yoncheva were scheduled for a revival of Günter Krämer’s 1999 production of “La Juive”. It was last shown in 2015, and was cancelled due to illness (“Krankheitsbedingte Absagen …”).
Of the four substitute performances of “La bohème” (the 1963 Zeffirelli production), the Russian gets three, with Eleonora Buratto as Mimì in the second performance.
Thank you for clearing this up.
Actually, Alagna and Yoncheva pulled out of 5 performances of “La Juive”. These performances are being replaced by the 4 “Bohème” performances you mention plus one extra performance of “Carmen” with Garanca and Beczala.
That’s right folks, keep lashing out. The slipped disc comments section is such a powerful place to make visible changes in the world, and through just one powerful anonymous comment, mountains will move and changes will be immediately implanted according to their views.
Not.
Yet, here you are posting…
He can’t find other singers for what is arguably the most popular opera in the repertoire? The PR of the Vienna State Opera is sorely lacking inspiration for their excuses.
Norman, I believe you are mistaken. The Vienna State Opera doesn’t need AN to sell the opening of the season, they need the opening of the season to sell AN. The opening sells always, no matter what (incidentally to those who don’t understand opera and couldn’t care less about the artform, but care to be seen there on that particular night), which is what Roscic needs in order to be able to tell the media later ‘See? She sells, we need her.’ Exactly like Dominique Meyer a few months back when he was trying to convince everybody that the La Scala _recital concert_ sold in great hurry to _Russian fans_ was an indication that _Italian audiences_ would lineup in a mile long queue half an year later to buy tickets to _opera performances_ of which she was going to be a member of the cast.
It would be nice, if somebody could check the fact, or rather present it, that Netrebko sells/does not sell tickets.
There are only passionate cries that she does/not.
There’s no serious study on a large scale and you won’t ever get to see one for as long as the corruption in classical music is carefully nurtured. There are currently a few ‘strategies’ touted as the magic weapon for attracting new audiences (and preserving the regulars), some of them being _decades_ old. Yet the ‘industry’ whines at every given opportunity about dwindling audiences, and used to do so long before Covid. Heaven forbid a study should prove their ‘strategies’ are worth less than the paper they’re printed on, and they have backed the wrong horse(s) all these decades. It is much more convenient for them to whine, and father state will very obligingly cover up the ever increasing deficit.
But if there’s no study, there is a rather simple experiment. Let AN live off solo recital concerts for a couple of years, no opera performances. Opera performances in Europe are state subsidized, recital concerts aren’t. We are told she has innumerable fans. I think we all agree that only fans buy tickets to solo recital concerts. Let’s see if the online noise makers translate into ticket buyers, considering that such tickets aren’t exactly cheap. After all, why should a singer of her ‘quality’ and private financial means sponge off the state? Let the fans finance her lifestyle, after all they are those who want to see her (yes, _see_ , not _hear_). If she can live off solo recital concerts, more power to her, win-win-win, the fans get what they want, serious opera loves are rid of her, and the state spares her fee subsidies. Yet she pursues exactly the opposite strategy since the war began – she tries with all her agent’s might to worm herself back into regular _opera performances_ . Don’t tell me she does so for the love of the artform, the woman doesn’t even know how to spell the word. We all know the advantage of regular opera performances – individual singers can hide behind the cast as a whole. Less pay but there’s safety in numbers.
Let’s see how regular opera performances sell without her. If there’s no noticeable drop in ticket sales, opera managers still won’t know what _does_ sell the house, but they will know what _doesn’t_ sell the house, namely AN on the playbill. Giving her the opening night (always sold out, always praised by ‘establishment’ critics no matter what), and claiming later that _she_ sells, is a strategy worth of a preschool, yet I’m sure we’ll live to see this from Roscic. He, like Meyer, has a very think skin.
Das Geld fürzt
Buratto is the real deal. Her creamy voice infused with a good dose of morbidezza reminds me of Tebaldi.
I always found Anna Netrebko to be an excellent singer. Don’t know about her political, sexual or culinary preferences, however. Is she really a vegan?
I don’t know, but she’s certainly not undernourished.
Donna Anna last sang Mimi at the Wiener Staatsoper in 2010.
Since then, the voice has not only deteriorated but become totally unsuitable for such a lyric role.
Wrong opera, wrong role and wrong singer.
Of course the celebrity obsessed Viennese will applaud her to the rafters.
For serious opera goers however, she is the warbling Richard Lugner of the Haus am Ring.
Bravo!
Sorry – am I missing something? It’s the first time I’ve felt less woke than Norman Lebrecht. She has always condemned the war in Ukraine since the invasion in March. And she lives and pays taxes in Austria so performing there isn’t hugely surprising. In fact she has been performing all over Europe recently so this angle smells of desperate click baiting
Ja ja, Herr Sznicker! she’s “condemned” what she had to “condemn”. By the way – do you know what “woke” means? how do you say in in Austria? well, you don’t. You haven’t woken up yet, for you it’s all the time like in the old days, a hundred years ago. About who pays whom and how much is yet to be discussed. PS. for the time being the russians are killing only the Ukrainians, which for the westerners is fine, who cares, bussines as usual – and isn’t ART the most important thing (let’s not mix politics with art!!!) I wonder what THEY will sing when putin – with whom Frau N never had anything to do (after all, she said so, no?) presents ALL of the Europe with a nuclear disaster. Hehe. Hehehe.
… only Domingo is missing from the cast of embarrassing misfits!
What an unpleasant scent hangs over Mimi’s garret.
An unpleasant scent hanging over Mimi’s garrett is what’s needed for the impoverished characters living in dingy quarters and establishes a nexus to Mimi’s tuberculosis. It adds a touch of verisimilitude.
Surprised? Metropolitan also did for Flagstad in 1950 and ROH did for 1947. The real problem is that is she that great to worth the fuss?
I hope you are not suggesting any parallel between Flagstad and Netrebko.
Changing the repertoire a little over a week before the season opens is a scandal. I cannot believe that there are no singers who can sing in La Juive.
Well, Alagna can sing Eleazar. His wife, Aleksandra Kurzak, can sing Rachel. She could do it, as she’s free on those dates. Alagna said nothing about his “illness.” Yoncheva withdrawal at the last minute is typical of her, she does it all the time – she withdrew from the same opera in Munich back in 2016. And that’s when Alagna sang it with his wife. But this time Vienna behaved as Vienna does, they showed him – and everyone who wanted to see “La Juive” an opera rarely staged – the middle finger. And “La Putina” takes all! Austrians in ecstasy – exit the Jewess, enter the russian!
It is not to Miss N they surrender but to the interesting crowd that follows her around wherever she presents herself. Opera is dying for the lack of competent, not necessarily rich, audiences. You know — when it was still alive they might be bakers like Pavarotti’s father, cheesemakers like Bergonzi’s father, blacksmiths like Tita Ruffo etc., and they knew their operas forwards and backwards and would correct erring singers. I don’t know who is more miserable in today’s opera, the stage directors or the rich, stupid audiences.
Simple people used to have more genuine appreciation for opera in their little finger than today’s haute monde in the whole of their pampered carcasses, but otherwise you are mistaken, today’s stage directors or the rich audiences aren’t miserable. Why should they be? The stage directors are the darlings of the enterprise, laughing all the way to the bank, and the modern, insecure but well-heeled audiences are the sheep of the enterprise, quite happy to fork over the money for whatever staging the high brow critics tell them they should.
All performances announced yesterday (La Boheme with Anna Netrebko in Vienna and the concert at the Hungarian State Opera) are sold-out. There is pent-up demand by opera lovers tired of political decisions. Anna Netrebko is a Russian soprano not a KGB war criminal.
Netrebko without Villazon ain’t the same!
She does not support the invasion. She denounced it a long time ago. But hey, whatever generates clicks and comments from the triggered.
She denounced nothing at all. Re-red that PR statement.
Roberto will tell what happened, sooner or later. He has a southern temperament, he will speak out (I like him for that!).
For now, they are both silent – Yoncheva and Alagna. I looked at their social media and there is nothing there.
I read that Yoncheva has otitis, a painful ear infection. My daughter had it and almost had surgery before it cleared up.
Poor Yoncheva. Her next performance is scheduled for September 16 (concert in Munich) so she will recover for that before collapsing back into bad health before Fedora at La Scala, premiering on October 15 (another supposed role debut).
Gutless cowardice by the opera company comes to mind.
There are hundreds of sopranos around the world and the Vienna Opera choses to engage the most morally corrupt singer around (tied with Domingo) (50%~50%) to sell tickets for them! What a rotten world!
I guess Putin and his cronies aren’t that bad after all..