Antonio Pappano and Riccardo Muti didn't have much of a relationship until a few days ago -- in fact the two maestri had never met, and there had been problems between them since 2004, when Muti pulled out of a Covent Garden Forza del Destino because he disagreed with the ROH changes in the Scala staging realized by Hugo de Ana.
Now all is forgiven: Pappano -- music director of Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Rome, invited by Muti to one of his Otello performances at Teatro dell'Opera di Roma, has actually been introduced to Muti at the end of the night. And Pappano has invited Muti -- who is about to become a constant presence at opera di Roma, with four more operas planned over the next three years, and probably more to come since there's a new member in the Opera di Roma board, Italy's most powerful TV journalist Bruno Vespa, a big fan and ally of Muti and someone who wields about the same amount of power the late Tim Russert did in the US -- Pappano we said invited Muti to guest conduct the Santa Cecilia orchestra (in Opera Chic's view, it's probably Italy's best orchestra, all in all -- la Scala still flaunts the best string section, but as a whole Santa Cecilia has an edge, lately).