The $5 million operations grant from Research In Motion co-CEO Mike Lazaridis and his wife, Ophelia, a Stratford board member, “will be handed out in increments as other individuals and governments commit to giving to the festival.”
Author: Laura Collins Hughes
Cleveland Orchestra, Players Reach Tentative Deal
“The agreement requires ratification by the musicians and the orchestra’s board, and that is expected today, giving the orchestra enough time to move forward with a scheduled trip to Miami for a series of concerts and educational events.”
At Berklee, Learning To Compose For Video Games
“Video games pull in $20 billion a year, roughly the combined revenues of the film and music industries. Berklee, one of a handful of schools prepping students for a field that barely existed 10 years ago, is eager to tap that booming market, one that’s making boldfaced names out of its most talented and prolific composers.”
Religious Group Sends Audio Bibles To Haiti
“These are solar-powered audible Bibles that can broadcast the holy scriptures in Haitian Creole to 300 people at a time. Called the ‘Proclaimer,’ the audio Bible delivers ‘digital quality’ and is designed for ‘poor and illiterate people,’ the Faith Comes By Hearing group said.”
Tehran Symphony To Play Controversial Piece In Europe
Some prominent Iranian musicians say the Peace and Friendship Symphony “lacks the standards of a symphony to be performed in Europe” and will dishonor Iranian classical music. “Composed by Majid Entezami in last year, the symphony was originally entitled the Islamic Revolution Symphony, but it has recently been renamed for the European concerts.”
China Yanks Avatar Off 2-D Screens
“According to a report in the Hong Kong newspaper Apple Daily, the move was made at the urging of propaganda officials who are concerned that ‘Avatar’ is taking too much market share from Chinese films and drawing unwanted attention to the sensitive issue of forced evictions.”
Jeffrey Deitch Brings A Spectacle-Filled Résumé To MOCA
“More than a little art-world lore surrounds the 57-year-old mega-dealer with a business degree from Harvard and voracious appetite for the new, the hip, and, of course, the headlines. Over the last three decades, Deitch has pioneered, chased and cashed in on just about every art-world trend,” including “a failed attempt at reality TV and a brush with bankruptcy.”
No Poe Toaster To Mark Writer’s 201st Birthday
“A mysterious visitor who each year leaves roses and cognac at the grave of Edgar Allan Poe on the writer’s birthday failed to show early Tuesday, breaking with a ritual that began more than 60 years ago.”
Oliviers To Honor Public’s Favorite Long-Running Show
“The new award is for shows which opened before January 1, 2009 and ran throughout 2009. … This means that 20 productions are in the running” for the Olivier Award, on which the public will vote.
A Chief Of Staff Spreads Poetry Through The Senate
“And so it is that he began lobbing poems into the e-mail inboxes of every chief of staff in the Senate.” The poems, by writers like Dickinson, Rilke and Williams, are “intended to get his BlackBerry-addicted, tunnel-visioned, life-as-a-treadmill colleagues to think about the ‘huge dimensions of life that get shortchanged’ in the grinder that is Capitol Hill.”