“Humility sets itself against many of our most fundamental impulses, clips our wings, and negates our desires – working, in a sense, against nature itself. … [Yet humility] is a virtue that is constantly in danger of subverting itself and turning into its own opposite” – proud and ostentatious.
Tag: 05.04.10
Um, Grown-Ups? Teenagers Don’t Bother With Twitter.
“I hate it when they say, ‘Follow me on Twitter,’ as if we’re interested in every little thing they have to say,” one 17-year-old explained. “It’s just an adult thing. Our music teacher kept saying that she would put stuff up for us to follow on Twitter until one day she said, ‘OK, who’s following me on Twitter?’ And no one raised their hand.”
Santa Fe Opera Chooses New Chief Conductor
“Frédéric Chaslin, who conducted Verdi’s La Traviata in Santa Fe in 2009 with Natalie Dessay as Violetta, confessed to lobbying hard for the job at a breakfast with general director Charles MacKay last August. MacKay was seeking a replacement for Edo de Waart, who stepped down the previous autumn.”
Dawn Upshaw To Direct 2011 Ojai Festival
“Soprano Dawn Upshaw has been named music director of the 2011 Ojai Music Festival. … [She] is the latest in a long line of guest artists who have been invited to help create programming for the four-day summer fest.” In addition, the festival is launching a collaboration with Berkeley’s Cal Performances to be called “Ojai North!”
Christopher Wheeldon On Running Morphoses: ‘A Harsh Reality Check’
“We were trying to deliver the level of work you’d expect from a long-established ballet company, but with a fraction of the staff. … I realised I was spending too much of my time just sitting in the office and worrying … It was a brilliant experiment, but I did what I had to do. I had to draw a line.”
‘The Glass Slipper Ceiling’ – Why Aren’t More Women Running US Ballet Companies?
“All top-tier ballet companies (budgets over $7M) in the U.S. are run by men. Of the next tier down, only four companies are run by women … This male domination of leadership roles is not true outside the States; England’s Royal Ballet, France’s Paris Opéra Ballet, the National Ballet of Canada, and the Royal Ballet of Flanders are all run by women.”
Minnesota Opera Postpones New Finzi-Continis For Two Years
“The Minnesota Opera is giving [Ricky Ian Gordon’s] The Garden of the Finzi-Continis a little more time to grow. The show was scheduled to round out the upcoming 2010-2011 season, but after a workshop last month Artistic Director Dale Johnson says it needs a little more time.”
Ethics For Aliens Discovering Earth
“There’s reason to hope that any extraterrestrials who find their way to Earth might treat us with respect.”
Baby In Tow, Alpha Mummy Investigates Opera For Infants
“Oscar, who wakes up every morning yelling ‘Mu-mic! Mu-mic!’ has musical tastes that range from Tosca to the whirring beat of the Magimix. But he’s stymied by the fact that babies are not, as a rule, welcome in the concert hall. … And so Oscar and I toddle off to Baby O….”
When Cockroaches And Bones Are Found Materials
A growing number of artists “have gone natural, … scavenging the world’s vivarium and rummaging through the life sciences in search of materials, ideas, cosmic verities, tragicomic homilies, personal agency, a personal agent, a way to stand out in the crowd.”