“Love to Tears” turned out not to last forever. Photo: APA/AFP via Getty Images
The famous opera couple, tenor Yusif Eyvazov and soprano Anna Netrebko, announced their divorce. They did so via an Austrian news agency. There was peace and quiet on social media. For fans, the news came as a real shock: the artists’ marriage always seemed to be prosperous.
However, in recent years, Anna’s fans have become much fewer. After 2022, when Russian culture began to be canceled all over the world with the outbreak of World War II, many theatres, under threat of breaking contracts, invited the Russian Netrebko to condemn her country’s politics. And she did it. Many considered this a betrayal…
Kirkorov sang at a wedding in Vienna
Anna and Yusif’s wedding took place in December 2015. It was a large-scale social event with a huge number of guests, elegant outfits of the newlyweds and luxurious treats according to the traditions of the USSR. The menu mixes Cossack rituals and Azerbaijani wedding customs (Netrebko is from Krasnodar, Eyvazov is from Baku). Yusif and Anna invited 170 people to their holiday.
The wedding ceremony took place in the Golden Hall of the former Viennese hotel Palais Coburg. Afterwards, the wedding procession of 15 fiacres (light horse-drawn carriage) moved to the luxurious Liechtenstein Palace. The newlyweds performed their first family dance to the song “I love you to tears”, which was sung personally by Philip Kirkorov. The guests were sure: such love would definitely last until the grave.
“After ten happy years together, we have made the difficult but amicable decision to separate,” the opera stars said in a joint statement.
The ex-husband stopped communicating with his son
The newlyweds already had marriages behind them. Anna has a civil union with Uruguayan tenor Erwin Schrott. This relationship lasted 6 years. From Erwin, the singer gave birth to a son, Thiago. Why did the couple break up? Anna spoke frankly about the reasons. They say that Schrott was a passionate man (“sex is wonderful!”), but he did not help at all with household chores. The solution to all everyday problems and the treatment of her son (Thiago was diagnosed with autism) fell on her shoulders. The busy tour schedule also took its toll. When one arrived home, the second was already on the way to the airport. After the breakup, Schrott practically stopped communicating with her son.
In September, the artist’s son Thiago will turn 16. Photo: Social networks of the hero of the post.
Yusif’s union with Anna was the second.
“He married the Italian Adele Ferrari, who is much older than him, for the first time,” a source from Yusif and Anna’s team told KP. – It was not a love marriage, but a business partnership. He needed to establish himself in Italy and acquire the necessary connections. Adele was able to give him all this; the sham marriage benefited his career. I don’t think they were connected by anything other than friendship.
His wife was 40 years older than Yusif. The entire family was involved in journalism; the doors of many influential houses in Italy were opened to them. After the breakup, Adele and Yusif maintained a good relationship.
Love story at work
Eyvazov graduated from the Baku Academy of Music and took part in leading productions at the Bolshoi Theatre and the Verdi Theatre in Milan. I met Anna at the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma in Rome. They sang in the opera Manon Lescaut. It was the premiere, Yusif came to the rehearsal, having painstakingly memorized the entire score, and Anna came unprepared and in a bad mood. Which she immediately told Yusif with a sweet smile. This news made him break out in a cold sweat and he thought that the premiere would be a failure. But Netrebko coped with all the assigned tasks. While preparing for the performance, the couple realized that they felt good with each other.
Yusif, unlike the singer’s first husband, turned out to be a thrifty man. With him, Netrebko felt like a real woman. The couple loved to cook, enjoyed taking care of the house and raising Thiago. Together they managed to cope with his autism. With the help of specialists, the boy overcame many problems and began to study at a regular school.
During their marriage, both spouses gained extra pounds. The tenor was the first to regain his figure. He began to wear sneakers on tour and made it a rule to go jogging regularly. Anna claimed that she does not go on diets. But recently, photos of her looking noticeably slimmer have appeared on the artist’s social networks. Gossips immediately decided that Anna was losing weight with special medications.
Strict financial contract
Now Anna and Yusif promise to maintain friendly relations and continue joint projects. Life will tell whether their creative paths will diverge. As for the division of property, everything should go well. Before the wedding, the couple entered into a prenuptial agreement. The groom insisted on it: he was afraid of being accused of self-interest. Yusif later commented: “a terrible contract.”
– Yes, nothing in his favour, poor Yusif. A brutal contract, a Viennese contract, an Austrian contract, the woman has all the rights,” Netrebko said. After the divorce, all the property will remain with her. However, Yusif admitted that this was correct: “All over the world, all laws protect a woman with a child.”
Of course, Anna was an enviable bride. But now the situation is somewhat different. There are no more impressive earnings in Russia (by the way, the price of a ticket for a couple’s concert in the Tchaikovsky Hall reached 170 thousand rubles). With the onset of the Northern Military District, when Netrebko began to be oppressed by Western partners, she lost her luxurious apartment in New York. The singer tried to sell the property she bought for $3 million (263.8 million rubles) for $7 million (570.4 million rubles). Anna never admitted whether she ended up selling the apartment or the bank kept it (the apartment was bought with a 30-year mortgage).
Apartments in the centre of Vienna with panoramic windows were also bought with a mortgage long before she married Eyvazov. However, having become Anna’s husband, he helped pay off the loan.
During the affair, the couple agreed that Yusif would move to Vienna with his beloved. There she and her children already had an established life and routine, but in Milan, where Yusif lived, everything would have to start all over again. With a special child, it is very difficult to find new specialists and helpers.
Friends of the star couple are confident that the couple will separate without any financial claims.
TO THE POINT
An heir could not be given birth to.
What caused the divorce? Again there is a discrepancy between the graphs and the distances.
– Another possible reason is the lack of common heirs. Yusif loves children, Anna could not give him a son because of her age – she is 52 years old, six years older than him, friends of the couple told KP.
Eyvazov recently became the director of the Azerbaijan Academic Opera and Ballet Theatre. The post requires his frequent presence in Baku. Add to this Yusif’s own tours around the world. Anna cannot be called a “Decembrist”: she prefers to live not in Azerbaijan, but in Europe.
