Some celebrities seem to be not only a product of their own personality, but of their surroundings as well, and never was a backdrop more important to a public figure than New York was to Truman Capote. “Perhaps he could have flourished only in the New York that was a city of literary ambition, the one after World War II, as his biographer, Gerald Clarke, contends. Perhaps he could have flourished in any New York, especially today’s, that prizes talent and a wink, as his friend Gay Talese, the author, contends. But what is clear is that he could not have become Truman Capote in any place but New York… Capote embodied a New York story of exile, triumph and disillusion.”
Tag: 09.30.05
The No-Longer-Quite-So-Cheap-But-Still-Quite-A-Bargain Seats
“For the first time in four years , the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra has raised prices on the cheap seats at Powell Hall. This comes in the midst of a publicity blitz for new symphony music director David Robertson, who is drawing raves. Before this year, the cheap seats were a terrific bargain at just $10. That’s for 71 seats in the first three rows (called Orchestra Front on the symphony’s Web site). These seats are not for everyone: they’re like the front row at the movie theater. But if you enjoy being really involved with the sound, you can’t beat it: the music is all around you. This year, the cheap seats went up to $15.”
The Evolving Art of Conducting
For the most part, the days when a conductor could rule his orchestra with rage and threats are gone, and most musicians expect the rehearsal atmosphere to be one of collegial, if not exactly friendly, collaboration. But as conductors have changed, the art of conducting has, as well: the physical demands are not nearly as great as the riddle of how to motivate a group of players and draw out their best performance. The best conductors are frequently those who never seem to be imposing their will on the orchestra, but still maintain a firm grip on the reins of interpretation. In other words, friendly is good, but respect is still the main thing.
The Power of Five
A group of regional performing arts centers in Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Boston, Hartford, and St. Paul have banded together to form a new production company, with the intention of developing new touring shows which can play profitably at the centers, and also creating larger shows which could be of interest to Broadway. The five centers will share production costs and profits, and all will have equal rights to shows developed by the new partnership.
Zeroing Out The Arts
“It’s not easy to pinpoint the day culture died at ground zero. Since four cultural organizations were selected for the site a year ago, the notion of giving the arts an integral role has been gradually – and more lately precipitously – slipping away. At this point, culture is being cast as a suspicious interloper… A lack of powerful, outspoken advocates seems to have been a significant ingredient in the erosion of culture at the site. By putting the development corporation in charge of choosing the cultural groups, the state failed to enlist an enthusiastic commitment from business leaders and philanthropists.”
Universal/Dreamworks Merger Dies On The Table
“Dreamworks SKG, the movie studio founded by a trio of entertainment moguls including the director Steven Spielberg, has called off talks to be bought by NBC Universal for about $1 billion… The failure to reach a deal was thought to have resulted from disagreements over the price and Mr Spielberg’s reluctance to give up the independence that he has enjoyed at DreamWorks, which allowed him to work with competing studios.”
The Mouse That Keeps On Giving
The Walt Disney Company is donating its considerable collection of West African art to the Smithsonian Institution. 525 pieces of traditional African art and craft, which were originally gathered by a New York real estate tycoon, will go to the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art, which has been struggling financially. The collection is difficult to appraise, but experts place its monetary value somewhere between $20 million and $50 million.
Build It And They Will Come (Maybe. When They’re Good and Ready.)
There was a time when the audience for classical music preferred – nay, demanded – that the genre be presented as a dressed-up affair, all formality and glamour, and that those in attendance listen “not only with their senses, but their soul.” These days, most classical presenters are considerably less picky – as long as there are butts in the seats, who cares what they’re wearing or if they squirm a bit? Amanda Holloway suggests that, in a world of seemingly endless entertainment options, catering to supposedly modern tastes just isn’t ever going to bring new audiences to the concert hall, and neither is reminding them constantly that culture is good for them. “No clever direct-mailing approach from an arts centre can replace… personal motivation.”
London Mayor Gets Personal In Statue Battle
The mayor of London is taking sides in a debate over whether a new sculpture of Nelson Mandela by artist Ian Walters should be placed in Trafalgar Square. The Westminster City Council decided on the advice of renowned sculptor Glynn Williams to reject the statue, saying it doesn’t fit the area. Mayor Ken Livingstone took expection, and took a highly personal shot at Williams in the process, holding up a photo of a Williams sculpture design and declaring that “The only sense in which that looks like [former UK Prime Minister] Harold Wilson is if he has been dead for several days, has started to decompose, and is emerging through a pile of dog mess.” Livingstone also pointed out that Williams’s design for that particular sculpture was rejected in favor of one by the very same Ian Walters.
The Voices In Your Head
You probably think that your taste in music is your own, borne of your free spirit and personal experience. Well, it isn’t. No, the people who tell you what you like to hear (or at least control what you have access to) are a motley collection of TV presenters, marketing execs, and general know-it-alls who you have never heard of, and who generally like it that way. Of course, they must be fairly good at knowing what you like, since you do like that new Coldplay single on your iPod. Don’t you? C’mon, listen to it again…