There may not seem to be much of a connection between British operatic life and the rather unprepossessing Austrian town of Bregenz. But Bregenz, on the border with Switzerland and Germany, is home to a famous festival that features an outdoor floating stage anchored in Lake Constance, which every summer houses a spectacular opera production, as well as a more conventional indoor theatre nearby.
Bregenz has a high profile in Austrian culture - each outdoor show is seen for two years running, attracting a total audience of around 300,000 - and curiously strong British links. The two most recent lake stagings (A Masked Ball and La Bohème), for instance, have been directed by Richard Jones, while David Pountney has worked there regularly, both indoors and out. Now Pountney's connection has been reinforced: from 2004, he will be the festival's director, in charge of all aspects of its financial and artistic policy.
That Pountney has landed such a post is no surprise. He is one of the most distinguished opera directors of his generation, someone who has devoted his whole working life to the medium. As director of productions at English National Opera in the 1980s, he was one of the triumvirate responsible for the company's famous powerhouse era, which in effect recalibrated production values of opera in this country. In a more rational cultural environment than Britain's, someone of his experience would now be running one of the country's major opera houses rather than having to work abroad - but that, it seems, is unthinkable.
In Britain conductors and directors - those who really know how opera works and what its peculiar demands are - seem to be automatically disqualified from ever running the companies themselves. There is not a single major-league opera company in this country that has ever given a real practitioner of the art form the chance to run the whole shooting match. Here, it seems, being a top administrator has to be about something more than the arty-farty business of putting the show on the stage.
And so of course it is, but that does not seem to have troubled the straight theatre for a moment - in fact, quite the opposite. When names were being suggested a year ago for Trevor Nunn's successor at the National Theatre, every one was a distinguished stage director. It never occurred to any commentator that somebody from outside the profession, whether it be television or commerce, was ever likely be the ideal candidate. So it was that Nicholas Hytner became the last in a line of real men of the theatre, who had all been artists first, administrators second. Everyone seems to agree that to run a famous theatre and its company, it is much more important to know how to get the plays on stage than to have a minute grasp of the theatre's catering.
Why, then, does opera specify a different set of values? Why is it so unlikely that Pountney - or Graham Vick or Richard Jones - would be high on the shortlist when a new general director for the Royal Opera House or for English National Opera is considered? Nicholas Payne, who runs ENO, is not a practitioner, but he has at least spent his working life in opera administration, unlike his predecessor Dennis Marks, who came to the job straight from television, just like two of the last three heads of the ROH, Jeremy Isaacs and now Tony Hall.
On the continent, it's different. There, it's much more likely that an opera house will be run by a conductor, director or an ex-singer. If British operatic life was envied abroad, then we might have reason to think our approach was the right one. But somehow I don't think the average German or Italian opera-goer would wish to be here rather than in their own country.
