Answers from the Met

For months the Metropolitan Opera had endured the barbs of its critics (TIME, Sept. 6 et seq.) with hardly a whimper. Last week, during an intermission of a nationally broadcast performance (and a good one) of The Marriage of Figaro, Met Board Chairman George A. Sloan finally started hurling the barbs back. Some fell in the target area; a few made bull's-eyes.

P:On producing the same opera several nights in succession (to save money on moving scenery): "Many roles are sung by artists who have won public acclaim in a particular part . . . The roles are so exacting that one artist cannot sing two nights in succession . . ." Anyway, "how about the many [out-of-town] music lovers who . . . want variety in opera just as they want variety in Broadway plays? What would they think, when here for a week of opera, if we produced the same work several nights in succession?"

P:On the quality of the Met's performances (frequently criticized by Manhattan critics): "I realize that with the millions of Metropolitan friends who listen to the ... broadcasts, I am talking to a prejudiced audience--men and women of musical understanding . . . Rest assured that your enjoyment . . . constitutes a critical faculty of very sound artistic validity."

P:On the Met's scenery: "Generally speaking.. . . designed by the outstanding and most famous scenic designers in the world . . ." (He didn't say when.)

P:On the Met's singers: "During the last decade there has not been even a handful of new singers in all the. world, of topflight operatic quality, who have not been engaged [by] the Metropolitan . . ."

P:On their looks: "Certainly a great voice within a beautiful figure is something to be desired by all concerned. We are doing everything possible . . ."

P:On modernized production: "Oscar Hammerstein II did a splendid job in modernizing Bizet's Carmen . . . Even so, is there a single opera fan who would attend more than one or two performances of Carmen Jones?"

Chairman Sloan's stand-pattish conclusion: "Our primary concern must continue to be with those who really know opera and support it, those who believe in its basic pattern, those who love opera for what it is, not what someone else thinks it should be." There was no immediate response from Met Critic No. 1 Billy Rose. George Sloan's shafts had been flung just 30 hours after Billy (see PEOPLE) had flown off on a trip around the world.

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