“The company survived the drama of its board leadership and longtime director trying to kill it and opened its 50th season Saturday night … with La Bohème. There’s nothing like a near-death experience to wake you up, and if the company had an elitist identity before its near-death experience, it now promises to become the community’s opera company.”
Author: Matthew Westphal
What Do Conductors Really Do? Two Of Them (Both Women) Tell Us
Rising young Mexican conductor Alondra de la Parra and mid-career Australian maestra Simone Young discuss learning and shaping a score, keeping your head about you on and off the podium, and why they’d rather not have to deal with the woman-conductor thing. (audio)
A Charlie Hebdo Survivor’s Testimony
Philippe Lançon: “I thought about Bernard, Cabu, and the others in my narrow field of view, all dead now, and I wondered, with no idea of how seriously I was hurt, what determined life or death … The only difference between us was a couple of inches’ variation in the paths of the bullets and our respective locations when the black-legged men came in.”
Osipova And Goddard Make History At Britain’s National Dance Awards
“The Royal Ballet principal Natalia Osipova and contemporary dancer Jonathan Goddard become the first to win in both major dancer categories, while Carlos Acosta takes home the lifetime achievement honours.”
The Many (English-Speaking) Lives Of “Anna Karenina”
“Why does a novel that already has at least six or seven English-language editions need yet another update? Journalist and author Masha Gessen discusses the difficulty of translating a literary masterpiece and argues the more the better.” (podcast)
Learning How To Sound Like A Woman After You’ve Become One
‘The hormones used in male-to-female transitions have no effect on the vocal cords, meaning that even after a cosmetic and surgical transition into women, the male-sounding voice often keeps transgender people tied to their old identities.” So a small group of voice specialists have developed techniques to teach transgender women how to make their speech patterns match their gender expression.
Scientists Have Discovered What Makes Someone A Good Dancer
“Northumbria University conducted a study about the male dance moves that are attractive to women. Now you won’t have to think twice the next time you go to a wedding. Just take a look at the science.” (video)
Henri Matisse – The Lost Interview
“On August 5th 1946, two years after Paris was liberated from the Germans, a young American soldier named Jerome Seckler visited Henri Matisse. … Until now this interview has never been published.”
Why TV Is the Perfect Place for Indie Filmmakers
James Poniewozik: “There is, arguably, richer potential in landing a TV deal than making an independent movie, shopping it around, and trying to get it attention in theaters. … But I’d also argue that TV is a good match for indie filmmakers for other than economic and practical reasons.”
Which Show Pioneered Race-Blind Casting On Broadway? (Hint: It Was In 1944)
“Bucking Broadway’s trend,” the musical’s creators – all children of Jewish immigrants, and so no strangers to discrimination themselves – “cast African-Americans to play ‘full-fledged citizens who were portrayed equitably with their white colleagues’.” And they cast a Japanese-American as the ingenue – in 1944.