Ancerl had flourished as the builder, director and inspiration of the Czech Philharmonic to its standing among the greatest orchestras in the world during the 1960s and 70s.
He's a seasoned collaborator, working with, among others, Reed, Björk, Yoko Ono, Boy George and Rufus Wainwright, a multitude of fringe artists (some of whom featured when he took over the Guardian's music site last year) and various orchestras around the world, including the London Symphony Orchestra.
The main victims of the cuts will be its two leading orchestras.
In London we have five wonderful orchestras, and only one (the BBC Symphony Orchestra) has anything approaching this kind of employment.
Then, she suggested that reducing the number of orchestras would lead to our having a superorchestra such as the Berlin Philharmonic.
As austerity sweeps Europe, artistic and cultural institutions have been among the first to face cuts, with theatres, opera houses, orchestras, galleries and educational programmes all facing existential threats as their budgets and public subsidies are slashed.
As a result, from the start of 2013, countless theatres, museums and orchestras will see their funding either severely curtailed or, like the Internationaal Danstheater, cut off altogether.
Höppner says the merger will save little money, but lead to the death of two leading German orchestras.
The pair can remember not so long ago when dancing wasn't a rarity in the birthplace of the Gueckedou jazz band, one of Guinea's most famous post-independence orchestras.
Most orchestras would mark a big anniversary with as much pomp and circumstance as they could muster, but not the Berlin Philharmonic.
Victor von Oertzen, a director of SWR in Stuttgart, said: "The SWR is quite simply proud of both its orchestras and everyone would like to keep them.
