Peter Sellars is hard at work putting together the next Adelaide Festival. “Decrying many Australian and American festivals for relying heavily on what he calls ‘a yuppie shopping spree’ of European works, Sellars has confirmed he will present a predominantly local program in Adelaide. It is a proposition that alternately dazzles and horrifies people, as do his challenging images of large-scale community collaborations likely to involve Asian countries.” – The Age (Melbourne)
Author: Douglas McLennan
SIMPLIFYING GERMAN
In the interest of efficiency, the European Union has decided to use “new” simplified German in its business. The simplified language, introduced two years ago, “cut the number of spelling rules from 212 to 112 and those governing usage of commas from 52 to nine. German’s Lego-like way of constructing words was also changed by preventing one very long one being created from several.” But the decision has Germans up in arms. – The Telegraph (UK) 08/22/00
TAKING BACK CREATIVE CONTROL
It seems like corporate people make all the decisions in television these days, that creative people – like writers – are at the mercy of the suits. “Some in Hollywood’s creative community are nevertheless trying to break this stranglehold – the one that says Disney, as just one example, will own, shape and control pretty much everything broadcast on ABC. They are taking chances many view as liberating after toiling on the focus-group driven, overly massaged ‘product’ networks are most comfortable serving up. These efforts vary wildly in size and scope and venture capital.” – Los Angeles Times
TOOLS OF THE TRADE
A growing number of artists are incorporating scientific techniques into their work – everything from X-rays and MRIs to anatomical drawings and bacterial cultures. “Reductive science collects more data than we can perceive. We need new ways of looking at the world around us. This is essentially what artists do.” – ABC News
PAVAROTTI SPEAKS
About taxes, about his new young companion, about his weight – “I am very chubby. I make a competition for very young singers. If someone comes out who is chubby like me, he must sing like a god.” – New York Times Magazine
REMEMBERING ALEC GUINNESS
One must resist the temptation of calling anyone the last this or last that; history – whether of theater, of film, or of the world — is far too cyclical for lasts. Still, with the passing of Ralph Richardson, Michael Redgrave, Laurence Olivier, John Gielgud, and Alec Guinness, some sort of era seems to have ended. If actors were onions, the core of Richardson would have been shrewd common sense; of Redgrave, quirkiness and neurosis; of Olivier, romantic dash; of Gielgud, exquisite lyricism; of Guinness, all-encompassing humanity.” – New York Magazine
CYBER-ORCHESTRA
- Last week Itzhak Perlman and the Philadelphia Orchestra performed the first live webcast under the new agreement with American orchestras to perform concerts on the web. How’d it go? Not ready for prime time, writes Detroit music critic John Guinn. – Gloff.net
THE MAKING OF MAHLER
“Is there a case to be made against Mahler’s legend, if not his music? How has his entry into Valhalla changed the way we listen and the way composers think? With his monumentalism, his fanaticism, his unstinting idealism, and his unstinting egotism, he has not always been what school counsellors call ‘a good influence’. He left in his wake a series of inimitable, much-imitated masterpieces and a great deal of confusion about what a composer is supposed to do.” – London Review of Books
REDOING BEETHOVEN
Mahler significantly “reworked” six of Beethoven’s nine symphonies. “Mahler’s editing of Beethoven generally pleased performers. But he made his changes in red ink on the printed music. Critics saw a lot of red ink and they raised the roof.” Now Leonard Slatkin and the National Symphony plan to perform the remade 9th symphony. “For those who know this music well, you’ll have fun spotting the differences.” – Chicago Tribune (AP)
SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT
LA Times critic Mark Swed recently lamented that American orchestras don’t play enough American music. Conductor John Mauceri responds in a letter to the editor: “While I totally agree with Swed and his passion for playing more American music, I would just hope he could find a way of embracing a larger vision of what constitutes important and vital music written on these vast and complicated shores.” – Los Angeles Times