Blog

Moore Selected To Run ABT

Rachel Moore has been named the new executive director of American Ballet Theatre. “Moore arrives at a time when there has been high turnover among the company’s executive directors and questions have been raised by former trustees about the company’s financial health. Ballet Theater’s auditor and company officials say the company is in good shape. This week, the company announced three new corporate sponsors and a challenge grant of $400,000.”

An Arts Incubator At Ground Zero

At the World Trade Center site, “an unusual nexus of arts philanthropies, arts organizations, and far-thinking designers is set to create an autonomous complex fostering the creative spirit on stage, page, and canvas. Tentatively dubbed the ‘Arts Incubator,’ the project is being bankrolled by such well-heeled organizations as the American Express Foundation and the Norman Lear Family Foundation and will be the handiwork of architect-turned-set-designer David Rockwell and Kevin Kennon.”

Multiculturalism – Trust The Ones You Know?

“A large ongoing survey of American communities seems to show, uncomfortably, that levels of trust and co-operation are highest in the most homogenous neighbourhoods. People living in diverse areas, it turns out, are not just more suspicious of people who don’t look like them; they are also more suspicious of their own kind. Because of that, they suffer socially, economically and politically.”

Kennicott: Something “Refreshing” About Sam’s RoadTrip Blog

Along with many ArtsJournal readers, the Washington Post’s Philip Kennicott has been following violist Sam Bergman’s RoadTrip blog. “There is something that is remarkably refreshing, given the sadly hamstrung public relations front that the professional orchestra community presents to the world. There are signs of intelligent life and unselfconscious candor. Bergman found a voice that spoke articulately from inside a world that has become all too reticent, nervous and polished in its nonmusical communication with the public. That his blog, which made the facts of a musician’s life fascinating, should be so successful suggests that the professional orchestral world has become so self-absorbed that it no longer knows what is interesting about its own microcosm.”

Guggenheim Commissions Serra For $20 Million

The Guggenheim has commissioned Richard Serra to “create a room-size installation of monumental steel sculptures, including seven new ones” for the museum’s Bibao Museum. “The region’s Basque government, which covers the museum’s operating costs and pays for its acquisitions, has spent about $20 million on the commission. The installation, expected to take 17 months to produce and install, is scheduled for completion in June 2005.”

The Golden Age Of Music (It’s Right Now)

There’s no end of doom and gloom about the music business these days. But that’s just the business. “There’s never been a better time to be in the music industry? Try telling that to the thousands of music workers who have been laid off over the past couple of years. Universal slashed its workforce by 11% last year. Tower Records filed for bankruptcy in the US two weeks ago. But with album sales rising and the phenomenal growth of ringtones and legal downloads, plus record-breaking years for merchandising and publishing rights, it seems the death of the music industry has been greatly exaggerated.”

Acousti-Guard – How Do You “Fix” Royal Festival Hall?

London’s Royal Festival Hall has a big problem. “The main problem is the hall’s acoustics. They’re awful. Simon Rattle once said that playing there ‘saps the will to live’. Even the RFH’s resident orchestras, who have historically been defensive about their home, now openly admit it ‘leaves a lot to be desired’.” But doing anything about the sound is more problematic than a mere acoustical upgrade…