“The Montreal-based Grands Ballets Canadiens has changed the name and theme of its show Femmes, after women” – and not only women – “criticized the company for commissioning a ballet touted as a tribute to women but choreographed by three men. The Grands Ballets was also criticized for the way it promoted Femmes, which included online ads with a picture of three male dancers trapped in ice.”
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Buyers Of Weinstein Company Back Out Of Deal After Discovering Millions More In Debt
“Three sources close to the investor group, led by former Obama administration official Maria Contreras-Sweet, said Tuesday that it found at least $50 million in undisclosed liabilities on the New York company’s books. The surprise debts, which would have significantly increased the purchase price of the assets, torpedoed negotiations.”
Eight Writers Get Surprise MacArthur-Style Literary Award
The Windham-Campbell Prizes, no-strings-attached grants of $165,000, go to English-language writers who don’t know they’re being considered. This year’s winners include British authors Olivia Laing and Sarah Bakewell, American playwrights Suzan-Lori Parks and Lucas Hnath, novelists John Keene (US) and Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi (Uganda/UK), and poets Cathy Park Hong (US) and Lorna Goodison (Jamaica).
Organizer Of Disastrous Fyre Festival Pleads Guilty To Fraud
Billy McFarland, 26, pled guilty to two counts of wire fraud and agreed to pay restitution of $26 million to the Fyre Festival’s investors. He faces a maximum prison sentence of 20 years for each count, though he will probably get eight to ten years.
Vladimir Jurowski Will Be Next Music Director Of Munich’s Bavarian State Opera
The well-funded company, among the world’s busiest and considered among its best, has engaged Jurowski, currently chief conductor of the London Philharmonic and formerly music director of the Glyndebourne Opera Festival, beginning in 2021. He will be joined at the company by a new superintendent, Serge Dorny, who currently runs the Opéra national de Lyon in France.
Musical About Serbian Dictator Behind Post-Yugoslav Wars Causes Furor In Kosovo (What Did They Expect?)
“Lift: Slobodan Show premiered at a packed theatre in Gračanica, a Serb-populated town outside Kosovo’s capital of Pristina. It was performed by a local theatre group and artists from Serbia. Kosovo’s ethnic Albanian majority shunned the play.” Slobodan Milošević, the eponymous dictator, died in 2006 while on trial for war crimes and genocide in The Hague.
Johannesburg’s Opera Company Shuts Down
With a statement that “due to the prevailing socioeconomic environment, it has proven very difficult … to raise enough funds to cover all operational needs,” Gauteng Opera announced that, after 19 years in operation, it will close at the end of this month.
A Photo Journal From The Ballet School In The Slums Of Nairobi
“Over the past 18 months Swedish photographer Fredrik Lerneryd, who is based in Nairobi, has joined [teacher Mike] Wamaya and the girls for about two dozen of their Wednesday ballet lessons.”
“Hamilton” Scores Record Number Of Olivier Award Nominations In London’s West End
That takes the crown from Harry Potter And The Cursed Child which last year scored 11 (tying with 2008’s Hairspray).
The Future Of Choral Music: On Its Own Track
“It’s no shocker to say that the choral and instrumental worlds have evolved quite separately over the past century. Highly chromatic or atonal music is rarely written for choirs, and the deep exploration of timbre found in instrumental pieces from later in the 20th century has mostly been ignored in favor of the pervasive choral sound inherited from the English cathedral tradition. Not only have the two worlds evolved separately, but their cultural importance is weighed differently as well.”