Eyebrows shot up last month when the Philadelphia Orchestra (which owns the building) and the Kimmel Center (which operates it) announced that the Academy Ball, held every year but one since 1957, was called off for next year and would be reconsidered entirely. Peter Dobrin makes the case that the Ball is a unique Philadelphia tradition that shouldn’t be ended but can definitely be made more relevant. – The Philadelphia Inquirer
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UK Finally Makes E-Books Exempt From Sales Tax, As Print Books Are
“Printed books and newspapers have always been zero-rated for VAT but until now their digital equivalents – such as books from Amazon’s Kindle service or online subscriptions to news websites such as the Times or the Guardian – have been subject to the sales tax.” (Audiobooks will remain taxable, though.) – The Guardian
What Happens To ‘The Merchant Of Venice’ When Shylock Is A Woman?
Carey Perloff, who directed Seana McKenna in the role last year in Calgary: “I am not always convinced that cross-gender casting helps illuminate Shakespeare; many of the plays focus so specifically on gender that swapping out men for women can sometimes muddy the actual narrative or intent of the play. But in the case of Shylock, who is the ultimate ‘other’ in the play, gender served to crack open the drama in fascinating ways.” – American Theatre
Composer Charles Wuorinen Dead At 81
Known for his adherence to thorny modernism and his strong opinions, Wuorinen won the Pulitzer Prize in 1970 for Time’s Encomium (the first piece of electronic music to earn the honor) but is best known for his opera adaptations of Salman Rushdie’s Haroun and the Sea of Stories and Annie Proulx’s Brokeback Mountain. – Yahoo! (AP)
Chanel Miller, Edwidge Danticat, Patrick Radden Keefe Win National Book Critics Circle Awards
Miller, the survivor of the rape by Stanford athlete Brock Turner, received the autobiography award for her memoir Know My Name; Danticat’s Everything Inside: Stories won the fiction prize; Keefe’s Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland took nonfiction honors; Morgan Parker’s Magical Negro won the poetry award. – Los Angeles Times
How Dallas Opera Ran Afoul Of Social Media Algorithms
As much as it sounds like something out of Isaac Asimov, we have to say it: we can’t surrender our discernment to the computers. What we need now — what will make our social media feeds and our national discourse saner — is not better artificial intelligence but more actual intelligence. We don’t need better algorithms; we need deeper wisdom. We’re not getting that from Facebook. – Dallas Morning News
Met Museum Hikes Pay For Top Execs
The highest paid executive in the most recent financial year, according to tax filings, was chief investment officer Lauren Meserve, whose total compensation package was worth $1.6 million, up 8.3 percent from 2017–18, when she made $1.47 million. The next best-paid exec is CEO Daniel Weiss, whose total pay package was worth $1.25 million in 2018–19, a 25 percent increase over the previous year, when he made $1 million. – Artnet
Data: How Movie-going Declined In North America Last Year
A detailed report released Wednesday by the Motion Picture Association helps to explain why moviegoing dipped in North America last year by 4 percent to $11.4 billion. Two key stats: The number of frequent moviegoers declined, and the number of tickets sold to all consumers slipped across every age group compared to 2018. – The Hollywood Reporter
How Coronavirus Might Change The Arts
As was the case during the AIDS crisis and in the months following the Sept. 11 atrocities, “regicide, civil strife and anarchy” tend to be replaced with great writers musing on the existence of God or the utility of religion, as Tony Kushner did in “Angels in America,” and they start to see that there are forces in the world that level us all. And the marketplace tends to reward those writers. – Chicago Tribune
A Different Way Of Understanding Emotional Intelligence
Here’s the 20,000 foot summary: Your brain’s most important job is not thinking or feeling or even seeing, but keeping your body alive and well so that you survive and thrive (and eventually reproduce). How is your brain to do this? Like a sophisticated fortune-teller, your brain constantly predicts. Its predictions ultimately become the emotions you experience and the expressions you perceive in other people. – Nautilus