More than a year ago, New York City passed a law banning cell phone use in theatres. Many thought the ban was unenforceable. “Broadway, Off-Broadway, and Off-Off-Broadway house managers asking audience members to turn off their cell phones before a performance begins is now a completely common practice. But has there been 100% compliance? (Anyone who attends the theatre today might suspect otherwise.) Has anyone paid the fine? Has anyone been physically removed for defying the law?”
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John Adams’ Nuclear Opera
Composer John Adams is at work on a new opera – “Doctor Atomic” – about scientist Robert Oppenheimer and the race to create the first atomic bomb. “I really thought I would never write a grand opera again: it’s so much damn hard work. But it just seemed, as in Nixon and Klinghoffer, such a potent theme with an incredible story that I could really sink my teeth into.”
All Beethoven Sonatas (Performance And Scores) On One Disk?
The story is told that the CD was designed to have the capacity to hold Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. Here’s something light years beyond: “all 32 Beethoven piano sonatas plus scores compressed into a single CD-ROM selling for $29.98, newly released by Newport Classic. Watch your DVD player or computer swallow it up, and you’re good for 10 hours of music. Buying the recordings on compact disc (on which they’re also available) and the scores as hard copies would cost around $150.”
Lapham: Dissent Wanted
Harper’s editor Lewis Lapham is full of dissent these days, and seems energized by it. “It’s in our character to want to be nice. We get uneasy with sharp disagreement. We have nothing like the prime minister’s question period” in the British Parliament. Add nationalist fervor to fundamental niceness, he says, and you get something close to the view that America can do no wrong. ‘People want to feel that their presidents know what they’re doing, that our artists are capable of masterpieces, that our weapons are invincible. That we’re No. 1 in everything.’ To think otherwise, in this context, is to be perceived as somehow un-American.”
Uffizi Faces Major Cuts
Florence’s Uffizi Gallery could see its budget cut by 25 percent next year, leading to severe cutbacks. “Premier Silvio Berlusconi’s government has approved the cuts, which will be discussed by parliament in the autumn and are aimed at containing Italy’s deficit within limits set by the European Union.”
Minnesota Pub Radio Buys Up Small Classical Station
Public radio powerhouse Minnesota Public Radio buys small independendent community station KCAL, St. Olaf College’s tiny, freewheeling classical music station. “Within 48 hours, WCAL was inundated with hundreds of e-mails and calls. ‘There’s sadness. And people are expressing their personal relationship with this station and with the announcers. They felt like the announcers were friends.”
SF Symphony Chorus Leader Stepping Aside
“Vance George, whose sensitive but painstaking leadership has forged the San Francisco Symphony Chorus into one of the nation’s leading ensembles, will step down as chorus director at the end of the 2005-06 season.”
Italian Culture Minister: Shut Down Uffizi?
Italy’s culture minister has threatened to shut down the Uffizi museum if the government does not scale back planned spending cuts.
CNB Star Departs Company
After 20 years, last spring Rex Harrington closed out a stellar career as a principal dance with the National Ballet of Canada. But it was still a surprise this week when the company reported he wouldn’t be sticking around in some other capacity. “I just realized there are certain things I’d like to try if I’m not going to dance.”
Online MIA: Classical Downloads
Why is there so little classical music available on commercial download services? “This is a missed opportunity and it shows the difficulty the downloading revolution has in coping with classical music’s enormous back catalogue and the stream of new releases.”