Peter Gelb isn’t backing away from his fight with soprano Anna Netrebko.

The Metropolitan Opera General Manager, who is currently on a media blitz, told Der Standard that the soprano was insincere in her statement against the war.

He told the media outlet, “In my view, she condemned the war purely out of expediency and only after the Met had fired her. I believe there are numerous examples of her sympathy toward Putin and his ideology.”

The statement comes a few weeks after Gelb’s media blitz in Ukraine, where he suggested that Netrebko spoke to the Kremlin before releasing her statement against the war. He said, “I believe she had certain discussions with the Kremlin. And, as I see it, she came back to me and said: ‘I stand with my country.’ And that was when I fired her. Her statement a month later claiming she was against the war — in my opinion, was insincere. It appeared only because I terminated her. Legally, I consider it to be an insincere statement. I don’t believe she truly meant it.”

In 2022 after Gelb made comments regarding the soprano, her manager, Miguel Esteban, noted that the Met Opera’s Lawyers would cease and desist from making defamatory statements. He said, “Peter Gelb continues his defamatory remarks against Anna Netrebko, despite assurances from the Metropolitan Opera’s outside counsel, Howard Z. Robbins at the law firm Proskauer Rose, that his client would cease and desist. On 30 March 2022, Anna Netrebko made a statement denouncing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and characterizing her arm’s-length relationship with Putin; her subsequent interviews in Le Monde and Die Zeit clarified any residual misunderstandings that may have suggested otherwise. Valery Gergiev is a conductor, not a politician. Peter Gelb has not provided any material evidence to contradict Anna Netrebko’s statements.”

Read Related Stories 

• Peter Gelb Claims Anna Netrebko Had Conversations with the Kremlin in 2022