To the great relief of many, Antonio Pappano has re-upped as music director of Covent Garden. “With New York’s Metropolitan Opera allegedly grooming him for succession on the event of James Levine’s retirement, the rumour mill went into overdrive when Pappano’s contract came up for renewal. The consensus was that, stung by the constant criticism of his choice of directors and weary of being ‘dismissed in one sentence’ in reviews of Götterdämmerung, he would not be staying.”