Writer Amanda Petrusich recounts the story of trumpeter Eric Vogel and the Ghetto Swingers, a band that played for officers and the Red Cross at Theresienstadt and, for a time, Auschwitz. Vogel later came to New York and became a design engineer and a jazz critic for Down Beat magazine. – The New Yorker
Blog
Many Popular Shows Will Probably Leave Netflix As Streaming Services Compete
These new streamers will be desperate for content, and will yank their own shows off Netflix. So “when do we reach peak streaming? How many services can the average viewer reasonably adopt? Is this the start of a dystopian TV future where only the wealthiest among us are able to watch 100 consecutive episodes of Frasier? Guess we’re set to find out.” – Jezebel
There’s Only One City Where You Can See Four Brand-New Full-Scale Operas In Four Months
“No place on earth rivals Berlin for the volume and variety of opera on offer, from Georg Frideric Handel to Hans Werner Henze. The city has three world-class companies, which this season have combined for a total of 85 fully staged productions. And they are investing in new works to run alongside the old war horses.” – The New York Times
Rahm Emanuel Offers To Mediate The Chicago Symphony Strike
“None of us want to see that jewel tarnished. After speaking with both parties, it appears that we should be able to achieve an end to this seven-week strike. Therefore, I am offering the services of my office to serve as a forum where both parties can work in good faith.” – Chicago Tribune
The Poetic, Bombastic, Brilliant Art Of Old-School Sports Writing
“The brilliant hard-boiled lyricism of Sandy Grady, in 1964, as he watches a crowd of Phillies fans after a home loss: ‘They hit the sidewalk with tight mouths, like people who had seen a train hit a car.’ Or Joe Palmer, in 1951, summoning a vision of the racehorse Man o’ War in motion: ‘Great chunks of sod sailed up behind the lash of his power.'” – The Atlantic
Meet Four Black Playwrights Who Are Challenging American Theater
“They are the talk of the theater world: a generation of black playwrights whose fiercely political and formally inventive works are challenging audiences, critics and the culture at large to think about race, and racism, in new ways.” A conversation with Jackie Sibblies Drury, Jeremy O. Harris, Antoinette Nwandu and Jordan E. Cooper. – The New York Times
‘The Most Powerful And Relevant Theater Being Written Today’ — Ben Brantley On New Plays By Black Writers
“I can’t remember a more electrifying run of new, innovative plays during my 25-year tenure as a New York theater critic than the heady spate of works by African-American playwrights that have opened Off Broadway during the past two seasons.” – The New York Times
New Wave Of African-American Playwrights In A Radical Moment
Wesley Morris: “Occasionally, a play ends and nobody really knows what to do, because it just took an audience to outer space, to the center of the earth, to this new electric zone that knows what’s wrong with this country and isn’t afraid to personify it, laugh at it, behold it. … The work is also black — its blackness providing a lens through which to see and be seen.” – The New York Times
10 Works Over 5 Years by Black Playwrights, All Intended to Challenge
“Oftentimes, the most outrageous of plot twists are what make that happen,” say Ben Brantley and Jesse Green. – The New York Times
Two Lawsuits Challenge Iowa Ban On Any Materials Containing Nudity In Prisons
“Under Iowa’s law, inmates no longer have access to mainstream publications such as National Geographic, says the lawyer Nathan Mundy, who represents Michael Lindgren, a tattoo artist challenging the statute in federal court. Mundy adds that his client is now not even allowed to draw his own nude figures, which will hurt Lindgren’s practice when he is released.” – The Art Newspaper