“What is it about dressing up that sophisticated people now find so off-putting? And who needs guests showing up at Halloween parties who are too cool or smug to bother wearing anything but black? Black is not a costume. It’s a downer. Say what you want about Marie Antoinette. At least she made an effort.”
Tag: 10.21.06
Culture City, Florida? (Not Yet.)
Conventional wisdom has long held that serious culture doesn’t stand a chance in Miami, a city known mainly for its miles of beaches and hard-partying tropical atmosphere. With the opening of a massive new performing arts center, that wisdom is being challenged like never before. But will the city’s ambitious cultural plans be enough to convince its residents to take in a play, or an orchestra concert? “Miami, after all, is the city that lost its symphony orchestra, the Florida Philharmonic, only three years ago. An ambitious new design district has yet to generate significant street life. And sun town still isn’t much of a theatre town.”
Rostropovich Not Going Back To D.C.
Cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich has canceled his upcoming appearance with the National Symphony, an orchestra he led for 17 seasons, saying that doctors have ordered him to remain in Russia while he undergoes tests. Rostropovich was to have conducted an ambitious two week mini-festival celebrating the centenary of Russian composer Dmitri Shostakovich.
Alabama Exec Resigns
The executive director of the Alabama Symphony has resigned after only three seasons. Paul Ferrone’s brief tenure in Birmingham was widely considered a success – “he leaves an orchestra with a balanced budget, a new music director and a growing statewide presence” – and it appears that the decision to leave was entirely his.
Laughing At Herself (And The Rest Of Us)
“Anna Russell, 94, who spoofed and honored the worlds of opera and classical music with her comic yet knowledgeable musical parodies, died Oct. 18 at her home in Batemans Bay, Australia… Miss Russell became a beloved figure for her knowing satires of musical techniques, pretentious singers and, perhaps most memorably, the operas of Richard Wagner.”
1906 Boston Symphony Recording Surfaces
“Tomorrow, thanks to a Florida record collector and a serendipitous turn of events, that song — believed to be the earliest known recording featuring members of the BSO — will be played on the radio for the first time. After WGBH found out about it earlier this week, the station included “The Kerry Dance” as part of its Sunday broadcast, which takes place exactly 125 years, to the day, after the BSO’s first concert in 1881.”