After 43 years John Crosby is stepping down from running the Santa Fe Opera. “A first-rate visionary and a second-rate conductor, Crosby has run his festival like a reasonably benign dictator, amassing an extraordinary record of significant premieres to counterbalance the tourist-attraction repertory. He has done much to cultivate domestic exposure to the neglected operas of his favourite composer, Richard Strauss, and has also helped discover several generations of important American singers. Glyndebourne was never like this.” – Financial Times