As Renata Scotto once said, “You want to climb the mountain. You know you are supposed to climb the mountain. But it is so difficult.” What makes it so difficult? James Jorden gives a thorough breakdown of the part’s challenges, musical and dramatic, with audio and video examples.
Tag: 09.20.17
Cincinnati Enquirer Lays Off Last Of Its Arts Critics
Classical music writer Janelle Gelfand was the last of the Enquirer’s arts writers to go. At its peak, the Enquirer had a theater, art, movie, food, classical, pop, and books critics, each with their own beats. The move comes only weeks before the city’s Music Hall was to reopen after a major makeover. Gelfand was leading coverage of the reopening.
Jeff Bridges Is Fine With Being The Dude Forever
“It’s been nearly two decades since The Big Lebowski, a tale about an emphatically nonchalant man named Jeffrey ‘the Dude’ Lebowski who gets forced over the precipice of chalance, transformed Jeff ‘the actor’ Bridges into an unwitting pop cult leader. … Jeff Bridges isn’t turned off by this, as some already famous actors might be – by the fanatical, undying popularity of a weird thing he did once, back in 1998, that no one has ever forgotten, that people quote at him ad nauseam. He’s too imperturbable, too Dude for that.”
Lillian Ross, Legendary New Yorker Reporter, Dead At 99
“[Her] innovative journalism appeared in the New Yorker magazine for eight consecutive decades, and whose profiles and articles were considered forebears of both the nonfiction novel and unsparing modern celebrity profile.”
How Mexico City’s Art World Is Doing After The Earthquake
“ARTnews has reached out to various museums, galleries, and arts organizations to better understand how they fared. This post is being continuously updated with details about how the earthquake has impacted the Mexican art world.”
World’s First Major Museum For Street Art Opens In Berlin
“There are certainly questions about whether the museum” – called Urban Nation – “marks the institutionalisation of an art movement valued for its anarchic spirit, where works are mainly painted at the dead of night, dodging the prying eyes of police and angry landlords. All the works in the museum’s opening show were created specifically for the gallery space, with some sculptures but mainly canvases.”
Top Posts From AJBlogs 09.20.17
What Museum Visitors Want to Know
Museums are mysterious to many people outside the art world (and maybe to people in the art world, I don’t know!). That’s why I highlighted Ask A Curator Day here last week, and why I … read more
AJBlog: Real Clear Arts Published 2017-09-20
Recent Listening In Brief: 3 Trumpets Redux
Dick Titterington, The 3 Trumpet Band Live at The 1905 (Heavywood) … read more
AJBlog: RiffTides Published 2017-09-20
Jazz community upends Englewood’s bad rep
The 18th annual free Englewood Jazz Festival in south side Hamilton Park last Saturday (9/16) affirmed the best of Chicago’s grassroots culture, … read more
AJBlog: Jazz Beyond Jazz Published 2017-09-20
The Artistry of Siegfried Tieber, Magician
The other night I was invited to a private session at the Magic Castle in Hollywood with a young magician. Siegfried Tieber — his real name, apparently, with no relation to … read more
AJBlog: CultureCrash Published 2017-09-20
Indomitable Pioneering Artist John Killacky Announces Retirement From Vermont’s Flynn Center
The Flynn’s statement cited Killacky’s emphasis on access and inclusion, as the arts center now works with 75 social-service agencies to provide discounted tickets for their clients. The organization provides $30,000 in scholarships toward participation in the Flynn’s classes and camps. Killacky also led a three-year, $2.3-million renovation campaign for the Flynn that received contributions from 274 sources.
One Thing Futurists Don’t Challenge In Projecting The Future (And Maybe They Should?)
No matter how radical these predictions are, they tend to take the long-term durability of capitalism utterly for granted: Responding to decades of stagnating wages and sliding labor force participation, the Institute for the Future’s report “10 Strategies for a Workable Future” (which is in many ways quite sharp and informative) acknowledges deep problems with our current labor ecosystem and digs into important issues of benefits, collective bargaining, and education. But it doesn’t even consider the idea that the challenges it identifies are inherent to a system whose primary objective and value is capital accumulation, not equity and the common good.
Music Derived From Heartbeats Could Help Diagnose Arrhythmia
“The driving, spikey rhythm of Mars from Gustav Holst’s The Planets is probably not the most comforting sound to hear through a stethoscope. A UK scientist, Elaine Chew is analysing the heartbeat patterns of people with arrhythmia – an irregular heartbeat – and turning them into classical music, in what she hopes may become an important diagnostic tool for doctors.”