Two years ago, the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra was plunged into crisis and delivered into the hands of the provincial government in a desperate attempt to prevent a complete collapse. To say things have improved is an understatement. “As the WSO’s current season closes this evening at Centennial Concert Hall, the 65-player orchestra is enjoying rising attendance, a balanced budget, and guarded optimism about the future. Since a new board took over the WSO last year, fundraising has revived, and a deficit of nearly $3-million has been cut in half. The city and provincial governments have forgiven about $400,000 in loans, and the federal government has tossed in a transition grant of $250,000.”
Tag: 04.30.05
The Play That Defined A Nation
England is a country awash in culture, with a particularly rich theatre history. Given that fact, you would think it would be difficult to single out one play that best defines the experience of being English throughout history. Not so, says Michael Billington: the two plays that make up William Shakespeare’s epic Henry IV contain everything you will ever need to know about being English.
Police Look In To Stolen Art “Show”
Seattle Police show up at an event held to return stolen art to local artists. The art had been stolen out of galleries over the past year. “To add to the confusion, the Philistine Group deliberately mislabeled all the art on the outer wrapping.”
The Discount-Airline Of Publishing
The book publisher MacMillan has launched a new discount series. The deal is spartan for writers: “If it decides to accept a novel for the list, terms are unnegotiable; no advance will be paid, though writers will receive 20% of royalties from sales. Macmillan will copy edit books, but if manuscripts need more detailed work, it will suggest that writers employ freelance editors. According to notes sent to authors, such editors “will charge realistic fees and this will not in itself guarantee publication”.
It’s Sort Of A Cross Between Electronica and Teddy Ruxpin
“Circuit bending started about 10 years ago when a geographically diverse group of basement tinkerers began to experiment with soldering guns and the cast-aside first-generation electronic Christmas gifts of their childhood. They discovered that if you pop the top off anything that has a simple circuit board and makes a sound — an ’80s-era talking doll, for instance — you can hot-wire it and produce squawks that the manufacturer never had in mind, squawks that in some cases had never before been heard. United by the Internet, circuit benders started sharing notes and trading pointers, and now they’re a certified subculture.”
Seeking The ‘Classic’ Holmes
According to everything we know of the world’s most famous fictional detective, Sherlock Holmes died at the Reichenbach Falls in a desperate struggle with his nemesis, Professor Moriarty. But just as Arthur Conan Doyle felt compelled to resurrect his creation several years after killing him off, so authors postdating Doyle have found Holmes to be an irresistable character for their own work. Why the Holmes obsession? The simple answer is that we keep buying the new stories, and the latest writer to step into the post-Doyle fray, mystery writer Chris Carr, can actually boast of being officially sanctioned by the estate of Holmes’s creator, and says that he is determined to return the detective to the world that Doyle created for him.
The Designer Everybody Wants
Set and costume design is not exactly the most high-profile part of the theatre world, but those who can do it well are some of the more in-demand individuals working onstage. At the top of this particular game is Santo Loquasto, whose work is so revered in theatre and opera circles that, in a recent week, he had four show openings in three cities in two countries.
A Dream Deferred, Not Necessarily Denied
“Henry Villierme was on the fast track to becoming one of the new painting stars emerging from the Bay Area Figurative Group in the late 1950s. He was so promising that he took a first prize at a 1957 art exhibition in Richmond while future famed artists Richard Diebenkorn, Nathan Oliveira and David Park received just honorable mentions. But unlike his contemporaries, Villierme never made that leap to worldwide recognition. Instead, he moved to Southern California to be closer to his wife’s family and raised his four children while earning money in different odd jobs.” Now, Villierme is enjoying a career renaissance in San Francisco, thanks to his agent son and an enthusiastic gallery owner.
Who Wants A Free Comic Book?
It may seem unbelievable to those of a certain age, but comic books are not terribly popular with today’s youth. Still, comics are a $500 million a year industry, with some savvy marketers behind them, and this coming weekend, “for the fourth year in a row, stores across the United States, England, France and other countries will be giving away 2 million comic books” in an effort to get more of us hooked on the increasingly diverse genre.
Making A Push For Cultural Tourism In Minneapolis
“If you’ve got it, flaunt it. And what Minneapolis has right now is cultural palaces, a whole raft of them, designed by some of the world’s leading architects. With about $500 million worth of museums, libraries and theaters nearing completion, the city’s arts groups are banding together to launch a national marketing campaign promoting the Minneapolis ‘arts explosion’… [Already,] European tour directors are adding Minneapolis to their itineraries, and architecture schools nationwide are making plans for their students to visit the city and its new buildings.”