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Things Seem Genuinely Hopeful At Baltimore Symphony For First Time In Years

Only a year ago, musicians and management were just ending a very bitter lockdown-turned-strike, and unflattering details of the orchestra’s severe money troubles had been splashed across the media. Now, despite the pandemic, there’s a new five-year contract in place and a spirit of cooperation. “It’s an astonishing reversal of fortune,” says the co-chairman of the players’ committee; “We’re working together in ways we haven’t in many, many years,” says the CEO. – Baltimore Magazine

BAFTA Overhauls Its Awards System To Make It More Diverse

“[The package of changes] includes adding 1,000 new members to its committee and limiting the amount that studios can spend campaigning for nominations, in a bid to recognise more diverse talent. The wide-ranging changes … are the result of a seven-month review process, which was triggered by heavy criticism over the lack of diversity in its major awards earlier this year.” – The Guardian

At 86, Sophia Loren Is Returning To The Screen

“[She] stars in upcoming Netflix drama The Life Ahead, which is directed by her son, Edoardo Ponti. In the film, Loren plays Madame Rosa, a Jewish Holocaust survivor who helps raise the children of deceased sex workers with whom she once walked the streets. She then strikes up an enduring friendship with Momo, a 12-year-old Senegalese orphan who tries to steal her candlesticks.” – The Guardian

Ford Foundation: Record $160 Million Lifeline For The Arts

The Ford Foundation this week is announcing an unprecedented $160 million-and-growing initiative called America’s Cultural Treasures, with substantial grants going to BIPOC (Black, Indigenous and people of color) organizations across the country. The grants are, in most cases, the largest ever for the 20 recipients in the first round. – Washington Post

This Fall’s University Enrollments Are Down

Although the enrollment declines were steepest at community colleges (-7.5 percent), undergraduate enrollment fell at all types of colleges, including private nonprofit four-year colleges (-3.8 percent) and private for-profit four-year colleges (-1.9 percent). The decline was more modest at public four-year colleges (-0.4 percent), although there were differences across public four-year institutions according to location, with rural institutions seeing the biggest decline (-4 percent) and urban institutions seeing slight gains (+0.5 percent). – Inside Higher Ed

Christgau: Remembering The Volatile Stanley Crouch

“Crouch was a fervent American who was an even more fervent African American. He loved to perturb all comers by arguing that in the end the Middle Passage was good for Africans, but nowhere near as much as he loved to praise the richness and diversity of the Black cultures that the horrors of slavery made possible. For him, the peak of these cultures was jazz — from Armstrong to bebop, please, post-’60s not so much.” – Los Angeles Times

Behind Americans’ Addiction To Crap

It’s not just that these goods are shoddily constructed and add to the world’s clutter. Often, they’re actively harmful. The labor exploitation crap relies on dates back as far as crap itself. Many of the “decorative knickknacks” we consumed in the nineteenth century, for example, were produced in British factories where thousands of people, including young boys, worked with materials that contained lead and arsenic for a couple of shillings a week. – The Baffler