Music scholars insist that if we listened to music the way a musician would, understanding how notes trigger feelings, how tones take on their own textures and meanings, then we might experience something more visceral and expansive. We could push deeper into every song. – The Paris Review
Month: September 2019
Kansas City Rep Gets A New Leader
Stuart Carden, who starts his new job within days, will be only the fifth artistic director in the Rep’s 55-year history. – Kansas City Star
Movie Box Office Was Down This Summer – But So Is Everything Else
“Out-of-home entertainment had a down summer in general. Attendance at Major League Baseball games is expected to fall for the fourth consecutive season, according to Two Circles, a sports marketing agency. Broadway attendance has declined 2.6 percent from a year earlier, according to the Broadway League. Full data was not yet available for concerts, but early numbers suggest a decline, according to statistics from Pollstar, a trade publication.” – The New York Times
How Words Attach Themselves To Meaning
“Our language is full of interjections and verbal gestures that don’t necessarily mean anything beyond themselves. Most of our words – ‘baseball’, ‘thunder’, ‘ideology’ – seem to have a meaning outside themselves – to designate or stand for some concept. The way the word looks and sounds is only arbitrarily connected to the concept that it represents.” – Aeon
New Understanding Of The Brain Argues For Lifelong Plasticity
It’s no longer a question of our brains being a product of either nature or nurture but realizing how entangled the “nature” of our brains is with the brain-changing “nurture” provided by our life experiences.” – Literary Hub
Fox News Commentators Ridicule GMA Apology For Dance Comments
In comparing Lara Spencer’s apology to a politician apologizing to an ethnic group, Arroyo is saying that he finds that practice laughable as well. But the most blatant example is Ingraham’s comment that the ballet class looks like “tai chi people.” – Dance Magazine
The Rising Star Soprano Who Taught Herself To Sing By Mimicking Two Opera DVDs
Growing up in Port Elizabeth, South Africa, Vuvu Mpofu never even heard opera until she was 15, and, with no voice teachers in town, all she had to learn from were video discs of La Traviata and The Magic Flute. And now she’s at Glyndebourne. – The Guardian
Propwatch: the kettle in ‘The Doctor’
Is a home without a kettle even a home? It is at least the first step towards home. And in The Doctor – Robert Icke’s coruscating new play based on Schnitzler’s Professor Bernhadi – the kettle is pretty much the only step. – David Jays
A Contrary View of Brion Gysin’s Calligraphies
A painter I know had this to say about his work as an artist: “Pleasantly surprised by his watercolour. But the calligraphies … I see too much repetitive strain there.” Personally, I love Gysin’s calligraphies. I don’t see “repetitive strain” in them. Repetitive, yes. But I like the repetitions. – Jan Herman
An Artist Is Turning A New Orleans Flood Wall Into A Mile-Long Story Of The City
With the permission of the Flood Protection Authority and funding from the Walmart Corp., the artist embarked on the first 400 feet of a historical mural that will depict major moments in New Orleans’ three centuries. If all goes as planned, the painting could eventually stretch a full mile. – NOLA.com