“Touting itself as the world’s only opera house to perform all of Mozart’s stage works every summer, the Warsaw Opera will perform the marathon programme this year from June 15 to July 26, but ensemble officials warned it could be the final curtain come August. With the subsidies cut, the opera house will no longer be able to pay salaries after the summer season, nor will it manage to afford its rent in central Warsaw. Director Stefan Sutkowski has announced he will resign once the Mozart festival is over.”
Month: May 2012
James Earl Jones At 81
“The real part of theater is being onstage with your fellow actors. The fake part is the glitter of it — that’s got nothing to do with the work of show business. Otherwise, it can do real head tricks — you start believing your publicity.”
Japanese Film Industry Thrives Despite Lack Of International Cachet
“Japan doesn’t seem that phased by its lack of clout. Inside its borders, it’s getting on perfectly fine: it’s still (just) the second-largest film market in the world, buoyed by the teeming V-cinema circuit. The industry is in a far healthier state in the early 90s, when its own studio system, undermined by VHS and US imports, was teetering on the brink.”
Russian Violinist Wins Queen Elisabeth Competition
Andrey Baranov beat out 77 international participants to win the Queen Elizabeth International Competition in Brussels on Sunday. Baranov, 26, from St. Petersburg, will receive a prize of 25,000 euros ($31,300) and use of the “Huggins” Stradivarius (1708), on a three-year loan from the Nippon Music Foundation.
The Argumentative Ape: Why Humans Are Wired To Persuade
Impulse thinking, confirmation bias, fuzzy logic – why did humans get such a flawed reasoning apparatus? It may just be that we eveolved not to reason, but to argue and persuade.
Baltimore’s Contemporary Museum ‘Suspends Operations’
“The Contemporary’s board voted unanimously to suspend its work, cutting short an exhibit scheduled to continue through May 27, and letting go executive director Sue Spaid and four part-time staffers.” Said the board president, “We are not shutting down. The museum is ceasing its programs for the time being. How long that’s going to be is everyone’s guess.”
Philadelphia’s Arts Sector Beginning To Climb Out Of Recession: Survey
“The region’s cultural organizations are showing signs of recovery from the fiscal crisis and deep recession that began in 2007, according to an annual survey conducted by the Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance. Individual giving is up, foundation support is up, earned income is up, and even some hiring is under way.”
Doc Watson, 89, Country Guitar Legend
Over a seventy-year career, “the blind folk singer and guitarist whose dazzling string work and homespun stage manner transported concert audiences … influenced such diverse musicians as Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead, Clarence White of the Byrds, the innovative acoustic picker Leo Kottke and bluegrass multi- instrumentalist Ricky Skaggs.”
Protesters Disrupt Israeli National Theatre’s Performance At Shakespeare’s Globe
At the Habima Theatre’s London performances of The Merchant of Venice, “spectators were met with airport-style security, advance notices of ‘conditions of entry’ and a note by the box office informing patrons that missiles, among other items, would not be allowed into one of London’s most beloved theatrical addresses.” (Protesters managed to interrupt the show briefly nevertheless.)
Vandals Attack 1600-Year-Old Synagogue In Israel
“The fourth-century Hamat Tiberias Synagogue was desecrated Monday night by vandals who sprayed graffiti on the walls and tore up the mosaic floor. The Israel Antiquities Authority suspects extremist ultra-Orthodox Jews who say the authority damages ancient graves during excavations.”