Tag: 11.26.10

A New Prize to Honor Rank-and-File Orchestra Musicians

“The Salomon Prize, a new gong launched by the Royal Philharmonic Society and the Association of British Orchestras, … is for orchestral players – or, rather, for a single orchestral player in a UK-based professional ensemble who in the eyes and ears of their fellow musicians has been ‘an inspiration to their colleagues and engendered a greater spirit of teamwork within the orchestra’.”

Next to Dance in Cuba: Joffrey Ballet

Officials at this year’s Havana International Ballet Festival have announced that they hope to host the Joffrey Ballet at the next festival, in 2012. Says Joffrey director Ashley Wheater, “I very much want us to go … and I also think it would be very important for Cuba’s dancers to see the work of the current generation of choreographers.” The problem, of course, is raising the money.

The Obfuscating Ways Corporations Describe What They Do

“As corporate complexity collides with the fanciful phrasing of image makers, it’s getting harder to tell what some companies actually do.” For instance, “Parker Hannifin Corp., a diversified industrial company whose products include pumps and valves, styles itself ‘the global leader in motion and control technologies.’ The description might equally apply to a maker of lingerie.”

Christmastime at Yiddish Camp

“In a chilled and snow-shrouded Catskills landscape, hundreds of people get together every December to try to breathe some warmth into a dying culture. For almost a week at a hotel here, organizers immerse the group, which calls itself KlezKamp, in Yiddish and the folkways of the Eastern Europeans who spoke that language until Hitler extinguished their communities.”

Cloris Leachman – Betty White With an Unchecked Id?

“The 84-year-old Ms. Leachman, whose first television roles came in the late 1940s and who has won more primetime Emmys than any other actress, is relishing her latest role” – in which she “chain-smokes, runs around the front yard in a lace bra, jumps a group of trick-or-treaters and tries to breast-feed an infant.” And her “off-camera antics and salty remarks are as unpredictable as any scripted moments.”