“He raised the Met’s musical standards to new and greater heights.” “No artist in the 137 year history of the Met had as profound an impact as James Levine,” Gelb said in a statement. He had been scheduled to make comeback performances of Brahms’ Ein deutsches Requiem this January 17 and 21 in Florence, Italy, but the concerts were canceled due to the novel coronavirus pandemic.

He was fired the following March 12 and never conducted again. Levine became music director emeritus and remained head of its young artists program but was suspended on December 3, 2017, the day after conducting a Verdi Requiem in what turned out to be his final performance, after accounts in the New York Post and The New York Times of sexual misconduct dating to the 1960s. Levine made his Met debut in 1971 and became one of the signature artists in the company’s century-plus history, conducting 2,552 performances and ruling over its repertoire, orchestra and singers as music or artistic director from 1976 until forced out by general manager Peter Gelb in 2016 due to Parkinson’s disease. Levine died March 9 in Palm Springs, California, of natural causes, his physician of 17 years, Dr. NEW YORK (AP) - Conductor James Levine, who ruled over the Metropolitan Opera for more than four decades before being eased aside when his health declined and then was fired for sexual improprieties, has died.

James levine met opera