At some indeterminate point in the last decade, Wynton Marsalis became the official spokesman for serious jazz. It’s an unlikely position for a man who had previously split the jazz world down the middle with his lofty pronouncements about the form, and his dismissal of many modern performers and their influences. But today, “with Jazz at Lincoln Center as the most powerful nonprofit jazz institution in the world, with a responsibility to its donors for the $128 million it took to build the halls, his declarations, and his answers to criticism, have become temperate and more like coalition-building.”
Tag: 10.18.04
It’s Not A Failed Restaurant, It’s Art! Buy Some!
Glamorously controversial UK artist Damien Hirst has an auction all his own this week at Sotheby’s in London. “This sale, which Sotheby’s expects will net between £3 million and £7 million will also be an opportunity for Nigel Q. Public to buy an authentic Hirst, even if it’s only an authentic eggcup.” The pieces up for auction are actually the detritus from Hirst’s now-defunct, clinic-themed Pharmacy Restaurant & Bar, which was conceived as part of the “Cool Brittania” movement a few years back.
What, No Tote Bags? No Mugs?
Minneapolis’s Guthrie Theater is in the final stages of its fundraising push to finance its huge new home on the banks of the Mississippi River, and that means that it’s time to involve the general public. Of course, the general public doesn’t like to shell out its hard-earned cash without getting a trinket in return, so the Guthrie is offering a range of options for lower-end givers. $100 will get you a refrigerator magnet, $1000 equals a set of new Guthrie notecards, and for $5000, your name gets nailed to a seat in the new $125 million theater.
And What Happened To Broadcasters Serving The Public Interest?
When Congress gave broadcasters a new digital spectrum, it did so with the expectation of getting the old spectrum back. Now broadcasters don’t seem to have any intention of holding up their end of what was for them an excellent bargain. “Last month, the Senate Commerce Committee killed a bill that would set a reasonable but firm deadline of 2009 for the return of the analog channels. In its place, the committee adopted a bill — backed by the broadcasters, naturally — that could enable them to hold on to most of their spectrum indefinitely.”