Christopher Frayling is the new head of Arts Council England, and he seems well suited for it. “To those who regard themselves as on the inside, Frayling is known not as a popular historian but someone who has sat on every cultural committee going and has connections stretching from, where? – South Kensington to, presumably, 10 Downing Street. He is a trustee of the V&A, chairman of the Design Council, and has previously been a member of the Arts Council, as well as, less respectably, helping to choose the contents of the Millennium Dome’s faith zone. Frayling is even better connected than his predecessor in the job…”
Tag: 12.12.03
Met Broadcasts – Where Are Our Priorities?
Jan Herman wonders about the scale of American culture that would allow broadcasts of the Metropolitan Opera go off the air. The Met needs $7 million to fund the broadcasts. “In major league baseball, $7 million would not pay the salary of a decent pitcher. The six stars of ‘Friends’ make $1 million each per half-hour episode. Compare this to the absolute top fee for a singer at the Met, Amercia’s most prestigious opera house: $15,000 per performance. No one, no matter how big, not even Placido Domingo, makes more. Mere bagatelle or pittance indeed. What does all this signify? Many things, of course. But one of them is that “given America’s wealth, talent, and educational resources, it could be the Athens of the modern world, but is fast losing that chance” and opting instead to be its Rome.”
It’s Official – We’re All Nerds
“Over the past decade, those cultural phenomena that we once filed as geeky minority pursuits have become our masters. The internet now boasts a global community numbering 679 million. Video gaming pulls in more annual revenue than Hollywood. For its part, the film industry seems increasingly in thrall to the comic-book movie , the sci-fi epic and the wizard fantasy. Next week sees the release of the final instalment in Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy, awash with elves and hobbits and surely the most monumental nerd-fest of the lot. All of which raises some frightening implications. Could it be that there are more nerds today than there were before?”
Indy Film’s UK Woes
“It felt disorientating to be British at the European Film Awards, now in their 16th year and celebrated at a ceremony in Berlin last weekend. Those of us from the UK mingled with movie-makers and press from a score of countries, all perfectly relaxed about enjoying films from other nations, even those requiring subtitles. It was hard not to muse gloomily on the difficulty for even exceptional non-English-language films to obtain exposure in a British cinema culture so in thrall to Hollywood.”
Video Store As Research Tool
“As budget-conscious film studios increasingly greenlight remakes of old films and recycled television shows (coming soon: “Cheaper by the Dozen” and “The Stepford Wives”), independent video stores are finding themselves with a new role in the $9 billion-a-year video-rental industry. They are often used as research libraries and idea factories for the movie studios in whose shadows they lurk.”
Do Musicians Know Best?
Orchestra musicians aren’t always the best judge of the conductors who make them sound best, observes John Rockwell. “Whereas critics tend to prize creative excitement, profundity of interpretation and charisma, orchestra musicians — while hardly forswearing such virtues, at least in principle — often seem to base their decisions about a conductor on his rehearsal efficiency and lack of pretension. There can be no doubt that Mr. Maazel is a fabulous technician. A lot of us agree that the orchestra has rarely if ever played better; it gleams. And no doubt his rehearsals run like clockwork. The controversy has to do with his interpretive skills, or depth, or vision. And the concern is that for all the pride orchestral players take in their music-making, efficiency trumps inspiration when they come to pick a music director.”
The Writer In Your Ear
A new CD gives us writers reading their own work. “Writers who seemed beyond our reach are suddenly in our ears, revealing the often startling distance between their voices and the ones we imagine while reading — not to mention the ones that grab us from a movie screen. One of the great surprises is finding which writers actually do voices and which don’t. When A. A. Milne reads from “Winnie-the-Pooh,” his creations sound like Victorian gents — soothing, paternal Victorian gents reading a bedtime story, it’s true, but rather Victorian nonetheless.”
The Last Year Of Met Radio?
For 64 years the Metropolitan Opera has been broadcast on radio every saturday afternoon while the company was in season. But this season may be the last. The broadcasts have “been a cultural lifeline for generations of listeners, both those who live in places far removed from any opera company and those who may live just a subway ride from Lincoln Center but can’t afford to attend. They are carried by some 365 stations in the United States, as well as in Canada, Mexico, South America, 27 European countries, China, Japan, Australia and New Zealand, reaching, according to the opera company’s most recent survey, an estimated total of more than 11 million. The Met has been unable to obtain a new sponsor to pick up the annual $7 million cost of the broadcasts.”
Fun With Plinths
Proposals for Trafalgar’s empty plinth are startlingly different from one another. “By 7.54am yesterday somebody had posted a plea on the Fourth Plinth website seeking the public’s reaction: ‘Put something fun there’.”