“It is really important that we understand who our audiences are, and how they are going to participate in the music-making. We have to stay current (with respect to) programming, our use of electronic media, the experience of being in the concert hall, also the experience of hearing music outside the concert hall. My effort (has been) to sustain and nurture this institution and figure out how to make it more meaningful (to more people).” (includes video)
Author: Matthew Westphal
How ‘Frozen’, Of All Movies, Conquered The World
Who’d have predicted that a cartoon about a pair of princesses would become the fifth-highest-grossing film of all time – and win a slew of awards, too? Maria Konnikova and some research psychologists look at what makes Disney’s latest hit so beloved far beyond its expected demographic.
T.S. Eliot And Groucho Marx’s Touchy Friendship
With a 1961 fan letter, the WASP mandarin poet began a famous three-year correspondence with the wisecracking Jewish comedian. Re-reading the letters while researching a book, Lee Siegel found some significant and complicated tensions beneath the mutual admiration.
She’s Everyone’s – Heck, Every Genre’s – Favorite Set Designer
Es Devlin “works with some of the highest names in high culture – Philip Glass, Russell Maliphant, Richard Wagner – and the massiest in mass culture – Kanye West, Jay-Z, Lady Gaga. She goes from twerk to Gesamtkunstwerk, and all tackled with the same keen rigour. She is, surely, the only person ever to have given the members of Take That a presentation on Belgian surrealism.”
‘Artwashing’, Gentrification And Real Estate Development
The formerly run-down Balfron Tower public housing project in East London, where artists are being given temporary leases as the complex is being converted to higher-end apartments, is the latest high-profile example of a process that “presents regeneration not through its long-term effects – the transfer of residency from poor to rich – but as a much shorter journey from neglect to creativity.”
George Lucas’s Museum Will Be In Chicago
The choice of Chicago over San Francisco and Los Angeles for the institution – to be called the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art – “reflects both a bungling of the billionaire’s legacy project by the board of a national park in San Francisco as well as an aggressive lobbying effort by Mayor Rahm Emanuel.”
Why Cities Should Be More Skeptical Of New Cultural Centers And Expansions
“A new book of research reveals that civic leaders and arts patrons tend to fall prey to specific planning fallacies when it comes to building new museums, performing-arts centers, and cultural expansions.”
Top Posts From AJBlogs 06.25.14
Working for Free, Pro and Con
AJBlog: CultureCrash | Published 2014-06-25
Seizure: Federal Prosecutors Issue Forfeiture Action
AJBlog: Real Clear Arts | Published 2014-06-26
Frames of Reference
AJBlog: Engaging Matters | Published 2014-06-25
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Hachette Buys Perseus Book Group
“The Perseus Books Group, founded by the late Frank Pearl in 1996, is being sold to the Hachette Book Group. Through the deal, Hachette will then sell Perseus’ distribution business to Ingram [Publisher Services].”
German Publishers File Antitrust Charges Against Amazon
“German book publishers have filed a complaint with the country’s antitrust authority against Amazon, accusing it of violating competition laws and asking the government to investigate. The complaint, filed last week, was announced on Tuesday, nearly two months after Amazon began delaying shipments of books from [German publishing group] Bonnier.”