The Denver Art Museum unveils its $62.5 million renovation this week, and museum officials are readying for a deluge of curious visitors. In fact, regulating human traffic flow is one of the major ongoing concerns for museums looking to upgrade their digs.
Tag: 10.07.06
Libeskind’s Denver Work Bodes Well For SF
Officials at San Francisco’s Contemporary Jewish Museum have been keeping a close eye on architect Daniel Libeskind’s addition to the Denver Art Museum, since Libeskind is also designing the Jewish Museum’s new digs. “His Denver building shows that what seems outrageous on paper can be bracing in real life.”
The “New” SPCO: Still A Work In Progress
It’s been three years since the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra dumped the idea of a music director, and abandoned the traditional American symphonic business model in favor of a more democratic approach that allowed musicians a role in artistic leadership, and placed board members and managers in the middle of the musical side of the organization. So how’s it working out? That depends entirely on whom you ask.
Where’s The CanCon?
The Canadian Opera Company has been getting plenty of good press since opening its new home in Toronto this summer. So you would think it would be the perfect time to showcase some homegrown Canadian operas, right? Wrong. “The company has had a lot of time to think about bringing some Canadian rep to its new stage, and so far that thinking has yielded no result.”
LA Opera Celebrates Something
Los Angeles Opera turns 20 this year. Unless it actually turns 58. It all depends on what your definition of an opera company is. More importantly, LA Opera has one of the more entertaining and colorful histories you’ll read, full of all the backstage wrangling and boardroom controversy that you’d expect.
You Can’t Tell The Players Without A Scorecard
The St. Louis Symphony has been on the rise ever since David Robertson took over as music director last year, but the amount of turnover among the orchestra’s musicians has hit a near-record high. 17% of the SLSO started work within the last two years, a very high number for an American ensemble. But there probably isn’t anything to be alarmed about: a combination of natural attrition and the sudden filling of several long-standing vacancies accounts for the influx of new blood.
New Contract, Old Cuts Unveiled In Newark
The New Jersey Symphony has a new two-year contract with its musicians that provides nominal raises but maintains several cuts implemented last year, including a four-week reduction in the length of the NJSO season, and a 12% cut in the number of full-time players in the orchestra. Ratification of the deal will allow the NJSO’s season to start on time later this week.
Good Start, But A Long Way To Go
Ontario’s Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony has pulled in $320,000 of donations in the two days since announcing that it was in imminent danger of bankruptcy. That leaves the ensemble with just over $2 million to raise by the end of the month.
Wouldn’t Recognize Home If They Saw It
September is the time when most orchestras settle in for the long winter season at their home concert hall, but no such relaxing schedule awaited the Cleveland Orchestra this fall. “The ensemble and music director Franz Welser-Möst began their winding journey in mid-August at Blossom Music Center [in Kent, Ohio.] Then they tested out the new concert hall at Miami’s Carnival Center for the Performing Arts, performed in eight European cities and opened the 2006-07 Severance Hall season.” Now, they’re in New York, wrapping up a 3-concert residency at Carnegie Hall.
From Here? No One’s From Here!
The California Biennial seems awfully un-Californian this year, to judge from the diverse array of states from which the featured artists hail. Of course, that in itself could be said to be fairly Californian…