“Classical music aficionados: Go away. This article is not for you. Instead, it is for everyone who sees classical music as a private club and who feels they’re standing outside the clubhouse.”
Author: Matthew Westphal
This Year’s Big Literary Embezzlement Case Is Still Not Over
“When Darrin Webb, a bookkeeper for Donadio & Olson, pled guilty to embezzling over $3.3 million from the literary agency late last month, it seemed like a bizarre episode in the industry was reaching a close. Webb’s theft, which leaves a storied agency facing the possibility of bankruptcy and a cadre of authors with holes in their bank accounts, was, by all industry accounts, an aberration. The tale, though, may not be over, as a lawyer is considering taking action against the firm and could file a class-action lawsuit on behalf of the authors affected.”
Is Appalachian English Really A Preserved Form Of 17th-Century English? (No.)
It’s a nice myth, and one of long standing, but myth it is, writes linguist Chi Luu. For one thing, language has no more remained static in Appalachia than it has anywhere else, and there has been migration in and out of the region, especially in the last century. Luu looks at the myths around Appalachian dialects and draws a connection with African-American Vernacular English.
The Ethics Of Art Photography: What Do Those Behind The Camera Owe Those In Front Of It?
Journalist Alina Cohen looks at four photographers’ projects – street hustlers in L.A., high schoolers in a Southern town where the proms were still segregated, victims of the 1963 Birmingham (AL) church bombing, and small-town Irish teens on the day before their 18th birthday – and talks to the photographers about their obligations to their subjects.
Meet Broadway’s Favorite Throat Doctor
“Breathless and behind schedule, Dr. Linda Dahl rushed into the waiting room of her office on East 56th Street in Manhattan where two patients, handsome men with chiseled physiques, waited. ‘Someone once asked me, ‘What’s with your patients? They’re all gorgeous,” she said later with a laugh.”
Banksy Road Sign Appears And Disappears Within A Day
The sign, a pictograph for a road crossing showing elderly people being carried by children, was installed in the English town of Clevedon (not far from the secretive artist’s presumed hometown, Bristol) sometime early Friday. By Friday evening it was gone. There’s no indication of whether the artist, authorities, or vandals removed it.
Once Censored In China, Peppa Pig Is Now Headed For Chinese Movie Screens
The cartoon character, aimed squarely at young children in Britain, somehow got a “gangsta” vibe in China, thanks to meme-minded internet users with Photoshop. The Chinese Communist Party, disapproving of gangstas, blocked the unfortunate ungulate on several large websites this year. Now the film unit of Alibaba (China’s Amazon) is reclaiming Peppa Pig for wholesomeness with a New Year-themed movie for kids.
Glyndebourne Opera Festival Names New Artistic Director
Stephen Langridge, currently director of music and drama at the opera house in Gothenburg, Sweden (and son of the late tenor Philip Langridge and mezzo Ann Murray), will join the festival in early 2019.
An Opera About Refugees, Written For Refugees
In Moses, a production of the Bavarian State Opera’s youth program and cast with a mixture of recent refugees, the children of immigrants to Germany, and native Bavarians, and set to “a mixture of new music by Benedikt Brachtel and adapted excerpts from Rossini’s Mosè in Egitto, the teenagers tell the story of Moses — common ground for followers of the Bible, Torah and Quran — with Brechtian interludes about refugee experiences and current events.”
The First-Ever Museum Of European History (Of Course It’s Contentious)
“It begins with the Greek myth of Europa and the bull carved in stone and it ends with the Brexit promise of Vote Leave on an official campaign T-shirt. Both items find their place in the House of European History, an EU-funded museum [in Brussels] that aims to tell the story of a continent. … But those seeking details on the French Revolution, or the life and times of Winston Churchill, will be disappointed. ‘The harshest criticisms comes from those who expected to see their national heroes,’ says [the director].”