Anyone who’s ever seen the theatrical blockbuster Phantom of the Opera was likely dazzled by the spectactular thirty foot plunge of the massive chandelier that dominates the set. Of course, someone had to figure out how to pull that stunt off, night after night, without killing anyone or damaging the set…
Author: sbergman
Bringing In The Young People
The holy grail of modern arts management is the quest for younger audiences. One consulting group thinks it has found the answer: offering heavily discounted tickets to premiere events that haven’t sold out on its members-only website. “Goldstar Events now has 315,000 members, two-thirds of whom are under the age of 45… Moreover, Goldstar’s younger members are far more ethnically diverse than the average big-city fine-arts ticket buyer.”
Omaha Musicians Claim Executive Greed
The dispute between musicians and management of the Omaha Symphony is ratcheting up, with the musicians claiming that the salary of the orchestra’s CEO rose an average of 20% over the past three years, as the musicians were held to a 2-3% bump over the same period. The orchestra management acknowledges that its CEO’s pay is nearly twice that of some comparable ensembles, but says that much of the raise came through incentive pay.
Push To Save SF’s Oldest Black Theater
“San Francisco’s arts community has launched a broad effort to save the Lorraine Hansberry Theatre, the city’s oldest African American theater company, which has been told it will lose its 19-year-old home on Sutter Street.”
Yale Pushed Into Antiquities Debate
An ongoing battle between Peru and Yale University over a collection of Incan artifacts from Machu Picchu is being seen as a new twist on a growing debate over ownership of antiquities. “It does not revolve around criminal allegations of surreptitious tomb-raiding and black-market antiquities deals. But if the circumstances are unique, the background sentiments are not.”
The Science Behind Vocal Clarity
It’s a question that has occurred to almost anyone who’s ever attended an opera – as talented as these singers are, how is it that they manage to be heard clearly over the roar of a full-sized symphony orchestra? The answer is a lot more complicated than simple volume, and it explains why sopranos are easier to hear than any other voice part.
Another Day, Another Auction Record
“One of Damien Hirst’s trademark medicine cabinets has sold at auction for £9.65m ($19.28m,) breaking the European record for work by a living artist. A private bidder paid almost three times the estimate at Sotheby’s for Lullaby Spring, which contains 6,136 individually painted pills.”
Throwing No Stones
Philip Johnson’s 1949 Glass House, “which opens to the public Saturday as a National Trust for Historic Preservation site, is austere, but not threatening. It is one of the great monuments of modernism in America, by one of this country’s longest-lived and most influential architects… But the evidence of daily life has not been scrubbed from the house,” and Philip Kennicott says that makes the structure all the more fascinating.
What Could Make The Movies Better? Your Couch.
A new 12-screen multiplex in L.A. is “offering the home rec-room experience in a darkened public space. Three auditoriums in the facility have been equipped with leather sofas, loveseats, comfy chairs and side tables, arrayed much like you would have them in your home. It’s a style Landmark calls ‘Living Room’ and it’s been a huge hit.”
Purple Reign
The Color Purple is flying high on Broadway, thanks in no small part to group pilgrimages being made by congregations at black churches around the country. “The groups have become a marketing phenomenon, turning the $10 million musical, which received mixed notices when it first opened, into a very profitable show for its backers, who include Oprah Winfrey.”