Russian star soprano Anna Netrebko will not perform in Lucerne after all. The concert planned for June 1 at the Lucerne Culture and Congress Center (KKL) was canceled under pressure from the Lucerne government.
ATS
“The KKL is not available for the Anna Netrebko concert on June 1,” the Luzerner Zeitung wrote on Wednesday. The public perception of the soloist remains controversial, continues the KKL in a written position paper, which the Keystone-ATS agency was able to obtain.
Fear for public order
The reason for the cancellation is the temporal and geographical proximity of the performance to the Ukraine peace conference, scheduled for June 15 and 16 in Bürgenstock (NW). The cantonal and municipal authorities asked the KKL to cancel the demonstration, because “a threat to public order must be expected”.
Asked about this, Armin Hartmann (UDC), director of education and culture of the canton of Lucerne, declared that the Lucerne government had warned against excesses and protests “which could threaten the security situation of the population”. In a letter, the Council of State expressed the “unequivocal expectation” that the planned concert would be canceled.
Anna Netrebko, for her part, says she regrets this unilateral cancellation “contrary to contractual obligations with the organizers”. His management indicated in writing that the peace conference did not take place until two weeks after the concert date. Furthermore, none of its almost 100 performances since March 2022 have resulted in any disturbance of public order.
Concert already postponed
Some credit the artist with a closeness to Russian leader Vladimir Putin. She notably celebrated her 50th anniversary at the Kremlin in 2014 and was displayed the same year with a flag of New Russia and a pro-Russian separatist leader from Eastern Ukraine.
She was increasingly criticized after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. This followed the cancellation of concerts and performances in the United States and several Western countries. The singer’s team points out, however, that Anna Netrebko, who lives in Austria and has Austrian citizenship, has made several statements in which she spoke out against the war and called for peace in Ukraine.
The performance was initially scheduled for June 2022, but was ultimately postponed by two years: due to Covid, according to Ms. Netrebko’s management; because Russia had invaded Ukraine shortly before, they say in Lucerne.
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