[Financial Times, 17 May 2006]

New York is aquiver. On Saturday the Metropolitan Opera will close its season with a snazzle-dazzle variety show honoring Joseph Volpe, its grandiose, self-aggrandising, about-to-be-ex- general-manager, writes Martin Bernheimer. He steps down after 16 years at the helm of what may be the world’s leading haven for the lyric muse.