Category: AJBlogs

Big Stakes For This Art Week
Tempus fugit! I’ve been meaning to write more about The European Fine Art Fair’s arrival in New York later this week, but have not had the time. But you can bet that I will be there, … read more
AJBlog: Real Clear Arts Published 2016-10-18

Artistic Excellence and Mutual Self-Interests
This post is part of a series in conjunction with TRG Arts on developing relationships with both new communities and existing stakeholders through artistic programming, marketing and fundraising, community engagement and public policy. … read more
AJBlog: Engaging Matters Published 2016-10-18

“Capital Overhaul”: My WSJ Review of National Gallery’s Reinvented East & Strengthened West
Here’s the cast of curators who reshuffled the deck with provocative pairings and strengthened representation of key artists, aided by the influx of some 8,766 works (219 now on display), acquired from the venerable (now defunct) Corcoran Gallery of Art. … read more
AJBlog: CultureGrrl Published 2016-10-18

The bizarre wonder of The Iceland Concert
About a week ago I went to see a cryptically named sort-of opera called The Iceland Concert at the John Anson Ford Amphitheater. … I got a bit lost in the storytelling — probably my fault, not the production’s — but the music and setting could hardly have been bettered. … read more
AJBlog: CultureCrash Published 2016-10-18

Ten years after: is music sexy?
From 2006: Love-hungry bachelors of the Fifties and early Sixties were notorious for using jazz and romantic ballads to grease the skids. Frank Sinatra, I’m told, was their artist of choice, though … read more
AJBlog: About Last Night Published 2016-10-18

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Welcome to … Where Are We?
Danish Dance Theatre comes to the Joyce Theater, October 13-16.
Help! I’ve been sucked into a nightmarish world known only to people who’ve seen too much dance. … read more
AJBlog: Dancebeat Published 2016-10-17

Inspiring talk
The talks at the important — and inspiring — DePauw School of Music Symposium — have started to stream.I gave the keynote, but that’s not as important to me as what others said. … read more
AJBlog: Sandow Published 2016-10-17

Monday Recommendation: Sanders & Strosahl
Nick Sanders & Logan Strosahl, Janus (Sunnyside)
Collaborators since their student days at the New England Conservatory nearly a decade ago, pianist Sanders and saxophonist Strosahl are dedicated to tradition and improvisation. … read more
AJBlog: RiffTides Published 2016-10-17

A Sanders-Strosahl Followup
Nick Sanders and Logan Strosahl, now and then put up a video on their YouTube channel. Their recent album is the new Rifftides Monday Recommendation (see the previous post). Here is a standard song … read more
AJBlog: RiffTides Published 2016-10-17

Silent Bond
Unspoken romantic feelings.  The absent, or undemonstrative, parent.  Kitchen table tales of a like-minded ancestor.  All of us have had deep connections to other human beings that are never expressed, yet hold a powerful influence over our thoughts and actions. … read more
AJBlog: Infinite Curves Published 2016-10-17

A good day’s work
I started writing newspaper and magazine profiles, mostly of musicians, some thirty-odd years ago. I only gave it up when my duties as a peripatetic drama critic grew too demanding. It wouldn’t be quite right to say that I regret having done so … read more
AJBlog: About Last Night Published 2016-10-17

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People will talk In today’s Wall Street Journal I review an off-Broadway revival of Horton Foote’sThe Roads to Home and the Broadway premiere of Simon Stephens’Heisenberg. Here’s an excerpt. * * * It’s no surprise that … read more
AJBlog: About Last Night Published 2016-10-14

Rejoicing Well, I think it’s thrilling that Bob Dylan won his Nobel prize. One of the most profound artists alive today. Someone who goes very deep in me. dylan-blog And I’m also thrilled because by choosing … read more
AJBlog: Sandow Published 2016-10-13

Rejoicing
Well, I think it’s thrilling that Bob Dylan won his Nobel prize. One of the most profound artists alive today. Someone who goes very deep in me. … read more
AJBlog: Sandow Published 2016-10-13

Colliding Ideas
Tere O’Connor Dance appears at the Joyce Theater in the second week of NY Quadrille. … read more
AJBlog: Dancebeat Published 2016-10-13

Other Places: Brilliant Corners … Neglected Ballads
On Brilliant Corners trumpeter, active blogger and close listener Steve Provizer not only names ballads that he believes don’t get enough attention, he also presents them in performance. … read more
AJBlog: RiffTides Published 2016-10-13

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Monday Recommendation: Cecil Payne & Duke Jordan
Cecil Payne & Duke Jordan, Brooklyn Brothers (Elemental Music) This classic pairing is an essential repertoire item in Elemental Music’s series reissuing Xanadu albums from the 1970s. Payne (1922-2007) was among the great baritone saxophonists … read more
AJBlog: RiffTides Published 2016-10-12

Dr. Richard Wang, enabler of AACM experimentalists, RIP
In his first college teaching job at Wilson Junior College during the early 1960s, trumpeter Dick Wang encountered a cadre of exploratory young Chicago musicians who would soon form the AACM (Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians). … read more
AJBlog: Jazz Beyond Jazz Published 2016-10-12

Snapshot: Paul Draper improvises a jazz tap dance
Paul Draper improvises a jazz dance on Rainbow Quest, a TV series hosted by Pete Seeger. This episode was taped in 1965. … read more
AJBlog: About Last Night Published 2016-10-12

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Keep It Simple
In speeches, presentations, and workshops, I frequently get to the Q&A session and find myself faced with not a few perplexed expressions. In general, people understand the importance of community engagement. However, staff members … read more
AJBlog: Engaging Matters Published 2016-10-11

Picasso and the Perfectly Bearable Likeness of Being
Picasso was, of course, a great and natural draughtsman. Even as a child he had a fluent and steady line, and was capable … read more
AJBlog: Plain English Published 2016-10-11

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Profiling Audiences in Pittsburgh and Charlotte (my new home town)
I am in the midst of another big life change, having recently moved from rural Maine to Charlotte …The arts scene here in this bustling boom town, where the population is increasing by nearly 20,000 people a year and every other corner features a new construction project, is naturally on my mind.  … read more
AJBlog: We The Audience Published 2016-10-10

The flickering veil
As I approach the far shore of middle age, I can now say without exaggeration that I remember a fair number of things that happened a half-century ago. … read more
AJBlog: About Last Night Published 2016-10-10

Music by Women
Saw a very nice concert this past week by the Lumina Duo – oboist Merideth Hite-Estevez and pianist Jani Parsons.  The program was all music by women from the 12th century to the present. … read more
AJBlog: Infinite Curves Published 2016-10-10

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This Week In Understanding Audience: What Does The Audience “Own”? and Do We Tell Audiences Too Much?
This Week: Do you own the culture you just bought?… How did TV become the medium for complexity?… Should we keep audiences in the dark about what they’ll see?… Measuring the effectiveness of arts policy … read more
AJBlog: AJ Arts AudiencePublished 2016-10-09

On diversifying audiences
This week The New Yorker had some shocking news: Andy Borowitz is only their second least funny humorist. In his “Shouts and Murmurs” piece “The Pences Visit Manhattan“, Douglas McGrath takes the blue ribbon. He …read more
AJBlog: For What it’s WorthPublished 2016-10-09

Recent Listening: Izabella Effenberg
Izabella Effenberg, Cuèntame (Unit Records) This is the debut album of the Polish vibraphonist and composer Izabella Effenberg, who lives in Germany. The CD brings together an imposing septet of European musicians in a chamber … read more
AJBlog: RiffTidesPublished 2016-10-08

Too late, too late!
“The gentlemanliness of our statesmen is no secondary excellence. It was said by Burke of a great nobleman of the last century that ‘His virtues were his means’; that he accomplished by a gentle and …read more
AJBlog: About Last NightPublished 2016-10-07

Ethereal & Other-Worldly: Transported by Agnes Martin at the Guggenheim
The mesmerizing Agnes Martin survey, organized by the Tate Modern and now gracing the Guggenheim Museum’s rotunda (to Jan. 11), enraptured me from the start: In the pocket gallery just off the first ramp is … read more
AJBlog: CultureGrrlPublished 2016-10-07

Diversity at the NSO — what could have been
Four things the National Symphony could have done to bring diversity to the classical half of their season-opening gala: … read more
AJBlog: Sandow Published 2016-10-06

Music, Music Everywhere, And Not a Chance To Think
Whether the music is by The Beach Boys, Bill Evans, Bach (unlikely), Bartók (more unlikely) or The Beatles, does a store have the right to impose its taste – or lack of it? … read more
AJBlog: RiffTides Published 2016-10-06

So you want to see a show?
Here’s my list of recommended Broadway, off-Broadway, and out-of-town shows, updated weekly. In all cases, I gave these shows favorable reviews (if sometimes qualifiedly so) in The Wall Street Journal when they opened. … read more
AJBlog: About Last Night Published 2016-10-06

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