The London Philharmonic has named 34-year-old Russian conductor Vladimir Jurowski as its next principal conductor, succeeding Kurt Masur. Jurowski has been the LPO’s principal guest conductor since 2003, and his star has been rising fast on the international scene. “His contract is for an initial five years. He will give a minimum of 25 concerts per year, as well as touring and working with the orchestra in Glyndebourne – spending a total of seven or eight months of the year in Britain.”
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New Hires At Ballet Pacifica
“Former San Francisco Ballet principal dancer Evelyn Cisneros-Legate has been named academy director of Irvine-based Ballet Pacifica. She will take over as head of the company’s school from husband and wife John Gardner and Amanda McKerrow when their contracts expire at the end of July… Also, Ballet Pacifica interim managing director Melody Wolfgram has been named executive director, effective immediately.”
Ramona And The Movie Deal
Anyone who was ever a child has probably read at least one Beverly Cleary book, and most of us have read far more than that. “Although Cleary’s 39 books have not achieved the quick sales numbers of J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series (120 million copies) or Lemony Snicket’s books (50 million), they’ve never gone out of print. And since 1950, when Cleary’s first children’s novel, Henry Huggins, was published, she has sold more than 90 million copies.” Now, at age 90, she has finally agreed to allow her popular “Ramona” series to be made into a movie, but is zealously guarding the character against the rampant commercialization she so detests.
Spotlighting “Art Extraordinary”
A unique art gallery devoted to so-called “outsider art” opens this week in Scotland. The gallery’s founder, a former art therapist, says that she intends to showcase what she calls Art Extraordinary: “‘visionary imagery inspired directly from the unconscious’. Many of those who produce it suffer from mental illness, but by no means all. Some are simply recluses, making art in private with no intention of showing it to anyone else.” The gallery will be the first of its kind in the UK.
Death Becomes Him
“No American novelist knows his craft better than Philip Roth. But in the past decade, as he turned out a series of masterworks and became, at 70, a bestseller all over again, Roth apprenticed at a literary form that was new to him: the eulogy.” Four close friends died in quick succession, leaving Roth meditating on his own mortality. The pain became the backdrop for his latest novel, which focuses on the death of its title character, Everyman.
George W. Revives The Protest Song
The 1960s were a divisive time in America, and the music of the period reflects the “protest” movement that flourished at the time. And though overtly political music has been out of fashion for decades now, the protest song is showing signs of making a comeback, thanks in large part to the divisive qualities of the Bush Administration. “These artists’ dissent is not the innocuous, war-hurts whine of U2, R.E.M., Ani DiFranco, Dar Williams or the Dead Kennedys that has passed in recent years as an expression of conscience, but a rage-grounded strain that sounds a lot like the potent snarl of the dispossessed and betrayed.”
The Business Of Being Twyla
Twyla Tharp is unquestionably one of the most influential figures in the dance world of today, but it sometimes seems as if the general public is completely unaware of her existence. A new biography aims to change that, and dovetails nicely with Tharp’s own efforts to market herself and her dances in recent years.
Berlin Goes For Glory
It seems like we’ve been hearing forever about the imminent rise of Berlin as a global center of contemporary art, but the city has never really taken the final steps necessary to compete with heavyweights like New York, Paris, and London. But this year’s Berlin Biennial may finally be serving notice that the scene is ready to be seen alongside the world’s best.
Wolitzer’s Return
Hilma Wolitzer has a new novel out, and that, in itself, qualifies as news. Wolitzer, who was one of the more celebrated authors of the 1980s and early ’90s, went through a series of personal tragedies following the publication of her last novel in 1994, and simply stopped writing fiction. She seems almost embarrassed by the 12-year bout of writer’s block, but the malaise came to an abrupt end last year, when the main character in her new book sprang to life in her head.
Tracking The Mystery Bidder
Last Wednesday, a single bidder at an art auction at Sotheby’s in New York spent a whopping $95.2 million for a Picasso portrait, and more than $102 million overall. This would be big news under any circumstances, but what really has the art world buzzing is the fact that no one seems to know who the buyer is, despite the fact that his photograph has been published worldwide. “Those who sat near him at the auction said that they were convinced that he sounded Russian. There were also clues to support that theory… Officially, Sotheby’s is declining to comment, but its executives were obviously caught off guard the night of the auction.”