“The quality of Brendel’s alertness — his sensual intellectuality or his intellectual sensuality, whatever it is — is breathtaking; and it is refined, solidified, by technique and scholarship and reflection, so that he never falls back solely upon the force of his own subjectivity. Like all musicians, he is an interpreter, but he is not another jolly manufacturer of “interpretations.” It is the music itself that Brendel desires to disclose. He believes that at the piano he can narrow the distance from the real. Brendel’s pianism is neither personal nor impersonal. That is its uncanny achievement.”
Blog
Mail Glitch Hits SF Ballet Ticket Holders
San Francisco Ballet’s new season opens this week. But many of the company’s season subscribers hadn’t received their tickets. “Subscribers ordinarily receive their tickets in December, well before the season opens during the last week of January. But as of Jan. 9, subscribers still had not received their tickets. The problem apparently lies with an Illinois company that was hired to provide the ticket services but ‘completely blew it’.” How? They sent tickets third-class mail rather than first-class.
Remembering Fayard Nicholas
“Fayard Nicholas, who died Tuesday at 91, and his brother Harold, who died in 2000, put generations of cinematic dance stars to shame, with Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, Maurice and Gregory Hines and even Mikhail Baryshnikov expressing fascination and envy.”
2005 Good To Canadian Movies
Canadian movies had a good year at the box office. “In fact, just about all of Canada’s Top 10 films in 2005 were popular, watchable movies.”
British Court Convicts Two On Illegal Filesharing
Two men have convicted of illegal music filesharing in the UK. They are the first to be charged in Britain. “High Court judges ordered two men to pay the British Phonographic Industry between £1,500 and £5,000 for making thousands of songs available online.”
Royal Ballet Sweeps Critics Awards
The Royal Ballet cleans up at this year’s Critics Circle National Awards…
The Copy Condition (Why Do They Plagiarize?)
“Why, given the potential for humiliation, do plagiarists run the risk? Are people doing it more, now? Or is it, rather, now just a matter of more people getting caught?” Anyway, there’s new help on the way – a journal devoted to the study of plagiarism.
The Sundance Disconnection
“To appreciate the Sundance Film Festival, 10 days winding up Sunday, as it is, you must embrace its contradictions. Here, the most high-minded artistic and moral aspirations coexist with hype, corporate self-congratulation and a ravening hunger for money and attention. All the values and pathologies that define the movie industry, — and perhaps American culture in general — are concentrated into a bitter, dizzying espresso shot.”
TV Without The TV… A Good Idea?
” ‘TV on demand’ is a hot new buzzword. Between iTunes, digital video recorders like TiVo, cellphones and PDAs that play movies, and countless streaming options over the Internet, it’s becoming a reality, wresting the power of TV programming from network executives, putting it squarely in viewers’ hands. Consuming TV shows in this way takes a bit of effort, as it turns out.”
A Plea – Make Nigeria The Next Capital Of The Entertainment World
No, really. It’s time, writes Larry Williams. “Give us a ministry for arts! When the machinery of entertainment industry is set in motion the income that it will generate will drop oil ‘to a mere second place.’ Michael Jackson and Bill Cosby can earn 200 million Dollars in 24 months, can you imagine what a ministry of art can rake in from the different forms of art, sports, tourism.