Two weeks have passed and somehow James Conway is still in a job. He is the director of the English Touring Opera, despite having fired 14 of its musicians because they were born with the wrong colour of skin. These middle- to late-career musicians were presented with a letter from James informing them that henceforth the ETO was no place for goddam honkys. Well, OK, it didn’t quite say that — it thanked them for their excellent work and told them they were out on their ears because Conway wanted to make the orchestra more ethnically diverse.
The ETO claimed they had carried out this cracker pogrom at the behest of the Arts Council — which wouldn’t have surprised me terribly. But the Arts Council reacted with commendably apoplectic fury and said it had made no such demands and announced it would be investigating the issue. Since then there has been radio silence from Conway and the ETO.
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