Broadway’s 2000-01 musical season showcases the work of a surprising number of young composers, including seven premieres of new work by songwriters in their forties or younger. “I think people are just wising up to the fact that they’re going to run out of revivals. Producers are finally realizing that musicals don’t just get born somewhere where you can go shop for them, and there is a groundswell of young people writing in a more pop vernacular.” – New York Times
Tag: 08.27.00
THE NEXT GENERATION OF MUSICALS?
A new program aims to help composers of musical theatre. “Twelve of the country’s most talented musical theater writers have been chosen this first season. Should marketable musicals result, the organization will also help produce them. Each recipient will receive $20,000, as well as health insurance for up to three years, while their new musicals are being developed at Musical Theater Works’ space on Lafayette Street opposite the Joseph Papp Public Theater.” – New York Times
THE ART OF NOT KNOWING
An interview with American art legend Robert Rauschenberg who, at age 74, is still creating, improvising, and expounding freely on “the way a serendipitist works.” “For me, art shouldn’t be a fixed idea that I have before I start making it. I want it to include all the fragility and doubt that I go through the day with. Sometimes I’ll take a walk just to forget whatever good idea I had that day because I like to go into the studio not having any ideas. I want the insecurity of not knowing.” – New York Times
HOW THE RECORDING COMPANIES TRIED TO STEAL COPYRIGHT
Last November the recording companies sought to “reclassify under the nation’s copyright laws all sound recordings, like cassettes and CDs, as ‘work made for hire’. That slight change would mean musicians would never again be able to own their recordings. Instead, record companies would become the sole legal owners of a record over its legally copyrightable life, currently 95 years.” – Salon
CROSSING OVER OR SELLING OUT?
Crossover recordings, once a low-risk, easy-profit cash cow that the big classical companies employed to subsidize more serious and expensive recording projects, have become a primary lifeline for those firms now that sales of classical recordings have flattened. But as the stakes grow higher and the new releases pile up, the debate about crossover flares anew. Is it a healthy means of bridging the gap between the classical and non-classical public? Or a crass ploy to kick new life into a sagging market? – Chicago Tribune
BICKERING IN BAYREUTH
For whatever the music and productions were at this summer’s Bayreuth Festival, most of the interest and attention was turned on the festivals’ internal squabblings for power. – New York Times
HONG KONG’S NEW REALITY
The Chinese government seized a shipment of books heading to the US after being bound in Hong Kong. The book is by a former White House official, and “the publisher and printer said the book, ‘The Clinton Years,’ was seized because among its 227 black-and-white photographs was a picture of President Clinton clasping hands and chatting at the White House with the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism.” – New York Times
MYSTERIOUS MASTER
“Nijinsky left a rich yet enigmatic legacy that still eludes full understanding.” Yet, more than a half-century after his death, the dance world is still endlessly fascinated with the dancer and choreographer’s work and bizarre life. – New York Times
THE ART OF COMPETITION
When the modern Olympics were revived in 1896, artists, musicians, and writers competed for medals right alongside the athletes, just as they had done in ancient Greece. The practice was dropped in 1948, but host cities are still required to present an arts festival along with the sporting events. Although a lack of sponsorship and poor ticket sales have dampened Sydney’s plans for next month’s event at the Summer Games, the lineup is still impressive – 70% of the artists involved are Australian. – The Sunday Times (UK) 08/27/00
TAKING IT TO THE STREETS
Gallery and museum attendance in Korea is down in recent years due to a popular view of fine arts as “pretentiously ritzy, untouchably high culture, and shamelessly time-consuming.” So what are curators and arts marketers doing to bolster attendance? “Holding exhibitions in the unlikeliest places in town – cemeteries, trains, warehouses, subway stations and local streets – for the very purpose of winning converts to the fine arts.” – Korea Herald 08/27/00