“Just as rock and pop have a long history of independent labels, classical music has its own well-established independent sector, where labels such as Harmonia Mundi, Hyperion, Chandos, Opera Rara and the low-cost phenomenon Naxos have been releasing high-quality recordings for years. Suddenly, triggered by the flight of the major companies towards movie soundtracks and crossover artists, the independent concept has taken off in the classical business, with any number of artists, orchestras and venues starting their own imprints.”
Blog
Scheduling Glitch Sidelines Six Major Movies
“In an unprecedented scheduling fluke, six upcoming first-run films have been “on the shelf,” as they say, for anywhere from eight months to almost two years. And these aren’t small, quirky indies. These are films with major stars and directors vying for major bucks.”
Those Ticket-selling Surcharges Invade Non-Profits
More and more performing arts centers are adding fees to ticket purchase. In the Jersey: “As the state’s arts centers prepare to launch their 2005-06 seasons this month, they are quietly upping the service fees on ticket purchases to pump up their bottom lines. Whether it’s a per ticket surcharge, a facility fee or a total order ‘processing fee,’ the real cost for a ticket can be 10 percent more than advertised.”
The West End’s Hollywood Daze
A Hollywood reputation has become one of the quickest ways to land a place on the British stage. “Over the past five years, London, especially during the tourist-rich summer months, has become the home to a new kind of production which could very easily be perceived as a hipper, higher-priced form of dinner theatre. Here’s the formula for this commercial cocktail: Add a dash of reasonably high-profile celebrity in a smallish cast play for a limited run. Shake well to generate maximum publicity. Pray the critics don’t chill it too thoroughly. Serve to an eager public.”
Is Warcraft Too Popular For Its Own Good?
One online game has become so popular that some worry it is sucking players from everything else. “With its finely polished, subtly humorous rendition of fantasy gaming – complete with mages, orcs, dragons and demons – World of Warcraft has become such a runaway success that it is now prompting a debate about whether it is helping the overall industry by bringing millions of new players into subscription-based online gaming or hurting the sector by diverting so many dollars and players from other titles.”
How New York Lost Its Dance Throne
“A truth must be faced before it’s too late: New York is no longer the capital of the contemporary-dance world. The point is not to declare a new capital – there isn’t one – but to recognize that there has been a shift in the power base since the formation of the European Union, where the creative landscapes in Amsterdam and Bucharest are just as vital as those brewing in Berlin, Brussels, Paris and Vienna. If nothing else, the European Union has cultivated a network of artists with no perceptible center of bureaucratic power.”
The Weather Channel’s Superbowl
No surprise – the Weather Chennel scored its highest viewership in its 23-year history. (Its numbers are always best the day before landfall.) “WC was seen in more than 1.9 million homes – 533 percent above its normal audience – and spiked to 3.1 million at 9:30 p.m. It was the day’s top-rated cable network.”
Hollywood’s Worst Summer Since ’97
“This past summer was the worst since 1997 for movie attendance, rattling the complacency of studios. For the 18 weeks from early May through today, domestic movie grosses are expected to total $3.6 billion (all figures U.S.), down 9 per cent from summer revenues of $3.96 billion last year, according to box-office tracker Exhibitor Relations. Attendance figures are even bleaker. Factoring in higher admission prices, the number of movie tickets sold should come in around 562.5 million, down 12 per cent from summer 2004. What went wrong?”
What New Orleans Means
“For a city of only half a million people, New Orleans looms as large in our cultural imagination as L.A. or Chicago. Playwrights, novelists, poets, film directors, painters, chefs, dive-bar raconteurs and especially musicians all have drunk deeply of the city’s heady brew of flamboyance and decadence, joie de vivre and fatalism, the sexy and the sinister.”
Orchestra World Offers Help To Louisiana Musicians
Offers of help are pouring in to members of the Louisiana Philharmonic. “Other orchestras, mostly regional ensembles where the pool of available musicians is small, are lending a hand, too. Many have offered temporary jobs or the prospect of auditions to the Philharmonic’s 66 players, who have scattered around the country. All but one of the musicians had safely left the city or were already elsewhere for summer engagements, members of the orchestra said yesterday.”