British theater is unapologetically political at the moment, and plays satirizing the Bush and Blair governments are wildly popular with UK audiences frustrated by the unresponsiveness of their leaders to public sentiment. But so far, the newly activist theater community has coalesced entirely around one point of view – the liberal one – and no one in the theater community seems to have a problem with that. Still, with some theaters beginning to blend political fact with Orwellian ideological fiction, the liberal dominance of activist theater is sparking debate in critical circles.
Tag: 09.10.04
Schwarz’s Troubled Tenure At The Seattle Symphony
Gerard Schwarz has been music director of the Seattle Symphony for 20 years. But his hold on the orchestra has been troubled in recent seasons. “The reasons are many and complex, including increasing conflicts between influential members of the symphony’s board of trustees and Schwarz over artistic and administrative policies and doubts about his future value as music director…”
Grokking The Club Talkers
Why do some people go to clubs to listen to music, then spend the performance talking away? “Talkers embody the raw Darwinism of popular music. The harshest public trial for any unknown musician occurs on the night she opens for somebody else, to an entire room full of people prepared to ignore her. She’s got to compel someone to listen or the jungle will close over her.”
Painter Gets Billion-Rupee Commission
Indian painter Maqbool Fida Husain has been commissioned by a Bombay businessman to create a series of paintings called “Our Planet Called Earth” for $21 million. “It is believed to be the biggest ever art deal in India. Husain, who is almost a cult figure in the world of Indian art, says he will use the proceeds of his sale to make a mega-budget Bollywood film.”
British Library Puts Shakespeare OnLine
“The British Library is putting online 93 high-resolution digitised copies of 21 of Shakespeare’s plays. The texts date from Shakespeare’s lifetime and are pamphlet editions of plays prepared to be sold after performances had finished. The printed works show how the text evolved and cast doubt on the idea of definitive versions of his plays.”
Veterans Criticize Warhol Museum Plans
American veterans groups are criticizing the Warhol Museum’s plan to show images from the Abu Ghraib scandal. “Tom Sokolowski, the Warhol museum’s director, said Friday the museum has not decided which photos will be displayed, but will choose from numerous images collected from various news outlets and Web sites.”
Riding The Internet To Musical Fame
“While the recording business litigates and lobbies over music being given away online, countless musicians are taking advantage of the Internet to get their music heard. They are betting that if they give away a song or two, they will build audiences, promote live shows and sell more recordings.”
Stars Vie For Architecture Prize
The Riba Stirling Architecture Prize is Britain’s most prestigious. This year’s finalists include some of the world’s best-known architects. “The list was generally welcomed by architects yesterday for its variety, although punters showed an overwhelming early preference for the gherkin: the new London landmark took 57% of the first 4,140 votes cast in a BBC internet poll, while Libeskind got 13% and the innovative Kunsthaus in Graz, designed by Peter Cook and Colin Fournier, was a whisker behind with 12%.”
Lying Liars And The People Who Can Tell…
“For decades, psychologists have done laboratory experiments in an attempt to describe differences between the behavior of liars and of people telling the truth. Some researchers, however, are now moving away from those controlled conditions and are inching closer to understanding liars in the real world. The researchers are examining whether several behaviors that have emerged as deception signals in lab tests are associated with real-life, high-stake lies.”