Guilty as charged, Ron.

Yes, I DO like gossip - not of the celeb kind, but of the 'high art' kind.  Don't ask me why I do, as I don't know myself.

If there is a genuine family problem, then, of course, I sympathise with BT and wish him well.

However.....as has been acknowledged, the 'no show for family reasons' has become such a byword with him that we can be forgiven for wondering what exactly is going on.  Everyone I know who gets tickets for a Terfel appearance, always add the rider 'if he turns up, that is'. 

And given that a reasonable and understanding man like Pappano is up in arms about this, it seems only right to assume we're not being told the whole story.

Personally, I no longer expect great things of Terfel....he has made his decision and it has not been in high art's favour.  He should head back home (where his heart obviously is), live on his investments and maintain the 'Brynfest'.  He has it in him to be a great populist entertainer (and I'm really not being derogatory, there - who would you sooner have singing lollipops? BT, or Michael Ball), but - and this is a fact - being a great populist entertainer and being a great opeatic artist are mutually exclusive. One will always suffer a the expense of the other, and you don't need to think too hard to guess which one it will be.

Terfel ought to bear in mind what a parallel career as a rock singer did for Peter Hofmann and the price that Pavarotti paid (vocally and in terms of reputation - not that BT's probably bothered about that) for all those arena gigs.

If I had a Ring ticket (and I wasn't all that bothered to miss out), I'd be mildly disappointed.  Tomlinson is the more conistent artist, but no one would deny that he is now past his best.  Sooner him, though, than the capricious Mr. Terfel.

Of course, some of us never really forgave him for taking his 'Walkure' curtain call with a Welsh flag draped over his back.

I have a feeling BT was treated somewhat kid-gloveishly by the Opera House high-ups.  I can't imagine any singer other than Domingo being allowed to do something like that (not that Domingo would want to).

So now we're told that the real reason why he pulled out is that Mrs Terfel doesn't like him having an international career. Virtually everyone who has commented on the Daily Mail website thinks that he's done the right thing, only one (when I last looked) suggests that he's been in any way unprofessional. Presumably opera singing is regarded as such a frivolous occupation that such behaviour doesn't matter - but what would football lovers say if Wayne Rooney abandoned the England side for a crucial game for a similar reason??

Personally I think Bryn's behaviour over the Ring has been utterly unprofessional and irresponsible towards the Royal Opera House whose contracts he signed and who devised this expensive project to showcase him, towards his colleagues (the rehearsal time in which he participated will now have been wasted - the double casting of Wotan will have meant that all the character’s scenes would have been scheduled to be rehearsed twice, once with him and once with Sir John Tom, so the rehearsal schedule will now have to be completely reworked  - and what if anyone had to make special arrangements to rehearse with Bryn at the times he made himself available?), and to the audiences who booked to see him. I remember that when he cancelled six months’ work to be with his wife when she was pregnant with their youngest, I thought that if Albert Dohmen, who replaced him then as Scarpia at the ROH, had dared to pull a trick like that, he would never work there again, and deservedly so. But it's a sad fact of life that, the more "starry" the performer, the more they're allowed to get away with, until they go too far. Bryn should take note of what's happened to Mrs Alagna at the ROH and, some years ago, to Kathleen Battle at the Met. As Swan_Knight says, the management has treated him with kid gloves up to now, but if he goes on letting people down and expecting to be forgiven, he could find that nobody's prepared to risk employing him. The money will continue to come in from concerts (when he doesn't cancel them) and records, but he won't have an operatic career. If that's his choice (or rather HER choice), fine. Nobody can force him to run his career in a certain way, but he'll have to learn that being a leading man involves a leading share of the responsibility for the projects in which he's involved.

A backup Wotan for Sir JT? Robert Hale is indeed the obvious choice if he's available (and he does have a family connection in the cast, with his lovely wife singing Third Norn). Albert Dohmen sounded good on this years's internet relays from Bayreuth. Falk Struckmann is also experienced, but didn't sound very happy at Bayreuth last year. Other British Wotans, less starry but reliable, who might be on hand, are Matthew Best, who did the Scottish Opera cycle, and Robert Hayward, who sang it for ENO (and therefore may only know it in English). But I'm not sure how their voices would expand to fill the ROH.

Let's wish Sir JT good health and hope that no other Wotans will be needed.

Future British star bass-baritones? I have a lot of money on James Rutherford, who was co-winner of last year's Seattle Wagner Competition - I caught it on internet radio, he sang a highly promising Fliedermonolog and "Die Frist ist um". He's doing Wolfram for Seattle shortly. He obviously has no plans to go for the really big parts yet - he's said that he'll wait until he's 50 before singing Sachs - which will give that beautiful voice time to mature like fine wine.

It may just be the perspective of the photo shot, but I never realised JT was so small!

RT,
 

Indeed, but no less powerfull! Can't wait to see Sir JT in the Ring preview in a couple of weeks, and am heartily grateful that it is he, and not Bryn Tearful.