“In vaudeville you had one show and that was it. You changed it whenever you felt like it,” Benny said, years later. But, in radio, “when you realized that every week you needed a new show, this got a little bit frightening.” In another interview, he recalled, “The first show was a cinch—I used about half of all the gags I knew. The second show consumed all the rest, and I faced the third absolutely dry.”
Author: Douglas McLennan
A Podcast Case For Taking Pop Music Seriously As High Art
“Switched on Pop takes the work of pop stars like Jepsen, Justin Bieber, and Ariana Grande seriously as music. While there is a surfeit of music criticism focused on the lyrics and personal backstories of these artists, there is little that considers the role of certain chord progressions or instrumentation. Harding and Sloan believe that the people behind today’s pop music are often brilliant composers, and that the nuance of their work is too frequently missed.”
So Facebook’s AI Bots Created Their Own Language. Is That Creepy? Maybe Not…
“In their attempts to learn from each other, the bots thus began chatting back and forth in a derived shorthand – but while it might look creepy, that’s all it was.”
The Instagram Dancer Who Stands Out
While Instagram has become a go-to forum for dancers recording themselves in class and rehearsal, Marlee Grace has managed to stand out, though it’s hard to pinpoint why. Maybe it’s her musical selections, which range from Justin Bieber to wind and waves; her playful, impulsive choices as a mover and iPhone videographer; or the sense that she’s not working toward anything in particular, just dancing for herself and anyone who happens to cross her virtual path.
Why Do Dystopian Science Fiction Cities Look So Much Like The Cities We Already Have?
Justin Davidson: “Most of us can imagine only what we already know, and even the fantasies of visionary filmmakers can be astonishingly earthbound. The inventors of nonexistent cities don’t have to worry about building codes, zoning, financing regulations, or even the need to make their structures stand up. Rather than use that freedom to unleash radical design or dream up darkly beautiful architecture, they simply recycle the present and make it bigger, and worse.”
Getty’s Multicultural Internship Program Has Had A Profound Impact On LA’s Arts Leadership
“The idea: Provide students with real-world professional experience at cultural nonprofits small and large, be it the Center for the Study of Political Graphics or the Museum of Contemporary Art. The first crop of 89 interns completed sessions at 80 arts organizations around Los Angeles in summer 1993. Twenty-five years later, the Multicultural Internship Program is still going strong. Over that period, the Getty Foundation has funded more than 3,200 internships at an estimated 160 Los Angeles arts organizations — including 120 internships this summer. That amounts to an investment of more than $12 million over a quarter century.”
Do Arts Degrees Matter When It Comes To Artistic (Or Career) Success?
“A study from 2016 assesses the odds of artistic longevity through the prism of academia: does a formal education enhance one’s chances of making it (and staying) in the arts? Using data gathered by Statistics Denmark, “Artistic education matters: survival in the arts occupations” analyzes more than 27,000 employment records between 1996 and 2012 across five categories of Danish artists: visual artists, choreographers and dancers, composers and musicians, film/stage actors and directors, and writers (including journalists).”
Troubled Stream: Pandora On The Decline?
“The company said it ended the second quarter with 76 million active listeners who accounted for 5.22 billion listening hours in the quarter, down from 5.66 billion hours in the year-ago quarter. The company lost $275 million in the quarter compared to a $76 million loss the same quarter last year.”
What Is Your Purpose? (The Universe Doesn’t Care)
“Take a moment to think about the mythologies informing your purpose. I’ll reflect on mine, too. The universe, however, won’t. And that might be the most meaningful distinction of all.”
How Today’s Art Market Became Today’s Art Market
Jeffrey Deitch: “One of the biggest misunderstandings of this is that somehow there’s the art market and then there’s, let’s say, the ‘good’ part of the art world,” such as non-profit organizations or museums, with their educational mission.