“Thanks to broadband technology, the internet has created thousands of new radio stations that, generated simply by the home PCs of amateur DJs, cater to every music taste, no matter how obscure. These days, anyone can be a radio star. You don’t have to be a technical whiz to join this radio revolution – all you need is a PC and a subscription to a radio website, such as Shoutcast or Live365.”
Blog
Dreaming Of Bamberg
English conductor John Nott has a dream job. In his five years as head of the Bamberg Symphony, he’s remade the orchestra. “The Bamberg musicians play with a dark, rich sound, but also a sense of fantasy and adventure. But it’s no surprise the players should seem so content: they are the only big cultural show in town, revelling in the astonishing statistic that 10% of the entire population – more than 7,000 Bambergers – are subscribers to the symphony orchestra.”
Paying The Performers – What A Concept!
“The growing popularity of satellite and Internet radio is creating a new source of royalties for performing artists… Under traditional copyright law, royalties have gone only to composers and music publishers. The new royalities, from airplay on the fast-growing XM and Sirius satellite services, are being paid to performers and the copyright holder of the recording — generally a record label or, in some cases, the people who lease the master recording.”
Atheists In America (Where?! Let’s Get ‘Em!)
America seems to be all about religion and demonstrable faith these days, with even the most secular of public figures feeling compelled to at least occasionally make nods toward their own piousness. In other words, it’s a rotten time to be an atheist. “USA Today put the number of nonreligious Americans at 30 million… There are 5 million Americans who are Jewish, but everybody knows a lot more Jews than they know atheists, and why? Because atheists are afraid to come out of the proverbial closet.”
Dreyfus: Attempting The Producers Wasn’t A Mistake
Richard Dreyfus finally speaks out about why Mel Brooks replaced him before the London production of The Producers opened last year. “Brooks has told Playbill magazine that he always had Dreyfuss in mind for Bialystock, calling the actor a “brilliant artist” and a “nervous wreck”. But Dreyfuss soon discovered that doing a musical was like ascending to the pearly gates and being banished to the hellfires at the same time.”
Dreyfus: Attempting The Producers Wasn’t A Mistake
Richard Dreyfus finally speaks out about why Mel Brooks replaced him before the London production of The Producers opened last year. “Brooks has told Playbill magazine that he always had Dreyfuss in mind for Bialystock, calling the actor a “brilliant artist” and a “nervous wreck”. But Dreyfuss soon discovered that doing a musical was like ascending to the pearly gates and being banished to the hellfires at the same time.”
Hollywood vs. High-Tech, Round 2
“Intellectual property legislation that failed to pass in Congress last year likely will reappear in the new session, but after 2004’s bitter battle, technology and consumer groups are ready to get more aggressive.” The effort to prevent stricter copyright enforcement is likely to have more corporate muscle behind it this year as well. Last year’s battles convinced many high-tech companies that they needed to go on the offensive, lest they get steamrolled by the entertainment industry’s highly effective Congressional lobbying.
Underground Net Pirates Convicted, Face Jail Time
For the first time in the U.S., two men have been convicted of illegally sharing music files over an online peer-to-peer file-trading system, and face up to five years in prison for their crimes. “The US Department of Justice said the two men operated the central hubs in a piracy community organised across the Direct Connect peer-to-peer network. The piracy group called itself the Underground Network and membership of it demanded that users share between one and 100 gigabytes of files.”
Sundance Giving Up On Original Web Content?
Five years ago, the Sundance Film Festival launched a parallel online festival designed to showcase the best examples of the new genre of web film, which everyone figured was just about ready to blow up. As it turns out, web film is pretty much dead, and these days, Sundance’s online component features streaming versions of the same short films shown at its main festival. “On the one hand, the new SOFF format is exciting news: Anyone with a computer can watch some of the world’s best new short films. But SOFF’s makeover also suggests that made-for-the-web films haven’t evolved as quickly as expected.”
Is Eddins A Harbinger Of Change In Edmonton?
The last few years haven’t been the best of times for the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra. Low pay, budget problems, and a lingering resentment from some musicians over the way the ESO dismissed former music director Grzegorz Nowak had some observers wondering if the orchestra could ever right itself. But the palpable enthusiasm emanating from all sides of the organization this week after the announcement that Bill Eddins would become the ESO’s new music director seems to be having a restorative effect on a troubled institution. The musicians were so sure he was their man that they asked the orchestra board to suspend the search process after Eddins’ last visit.