“Rival technologies that baffle consumers will run more companies out of business in the nascent music download market than will head-to-head competition, one of the lead creators of MP3 playback technology warned Wednesday… Consumers nowadays can store thousands of songs in a pocket-sized device, play music and videos on their mobile phones and buy albums at the click of a button. But to their chagrin, a bewildering array of competing playback compression technologies and anti-piracy software options determines which songs play on which devices.”
Tag: 09.29.04
A Sudden End For Georgian Orchestra
An overhaul of television in the former Soviet republic of Georgia has spelled the end of the Television and Radio Symphonic Orchestra. “As part of the reduction processes underway at the state-owned 1st Channel, the television management disbanded (the) symphonic orchestra that was formed in 1937 and basically has been recording compositions of Georgian composers and created a ‘gold fund’ – high quality collection of records for Georgian television and radio for the last 70 years.”
Not Innocent, But Essential: “Smile”
“Schubert’s ‘Unfinished’ Symphony, Coleridge’s ‘Kubla Khan,’ Dickens’s ‘Mystery of Edwin Drood’: These are all works of art left incomplete by their creators, works that have invited speculation and fantasy for years. Those with a love for American popular music would immediately add ‘Smile’ — the legendary, lost Beach Boys album, begun and abandoned in the mid-1960s — to this list. … So what are we to think of ‘Brian Wilson Presents Smile,’ a new CD released yesterday?”
Less Airtime For David Hasselhoff?
“Germany should have quotas for the radio airtime to be dedicated to pop sung in the native language, industry officials say. They estimate only 10% of German radio’s play lists is sung in German, falling way short of France, Italy and Spain’s 50% native language ratio.”
Neeson To Belfast: Keep Theater Open
Liam Neeson has joined those fighting to save one of Belfast’s oldest theaters, the Group Theatre, where many of Northern Ireland’s leading actors got their start.
Anxious Times Breed Uncertainty For Presenters
For presenters of international performing artists, the task has never been easy. “And the challenge has become ever more daunting in an age of finicky audiences, straitened budgets and international uncertainty.”
Copyright, Or A Father’s Ire, Forces A Painting’s Removal
A Damian Loeb painting that borrows an image from a 1990 Tina Barney photo was pulled from a University of Hartford exhibition, but why? “Was it merely a question, as the University of Hartford insists, of a painting removed from an important show because of suddenly discovered ‘copyright issues’? Or did an angry, powerful university parent, incensed that images of his children were included in a work titled ‘Blow Job (Three Little Boys),’ demand that the painting be taken down?”
For Blatantly Political Art, A Renaissance
“From the art capital of New York City to the nation’s midsection, visual artists are participating in partisan politics with a vigor not seen since the 1960s.” While large institutions are generally staying above the fray, some gallery owners have risked offending wealthy clients by making their political stance (usually liberal) known.
What Does Denmark Know That Canada Doesn’t?
While much smaller countries like Denmark put serious money into exporting culture, there isn’t nearly enough funding to promote Canadian artists and writers abroad. “Our top performing arts companies have to focus instead on surviving, because government cutbacks have left them without enough money to operate at home, let alone travel.” But culture may be the most important export Canada has to offer the world.
No Donations? Not So Fast
In the midst of a legal battle over artwork with the Beaverbrook Art Gallery, the Beaverbrook Canadian Foundation has said it will suspend donations to Canadian nonprofits. But under Canadian law, doing so may imperil its tax status as a charity.