Nine-year-old singer Amira Willighagen won Holland’s Got Talent on Saturday evening with a moving performance of Puccini’s “Nessun Dorma.”
Tag: 12.29.13
Herb Geller, 85, Saxophonist And Composer
“Initially, he was prominent among the musicians who created the west coast jazz style, picking up combo gigs and recording dates with the best players in California. Later, after the death of his first wife, he relocated to Europe and established himself as a salaried artist in a subsidised orchestra.”
Where Pulp Fiction Bridges The Ideal And The Real
“Battered between competing allegiances to the idealized homeland and the reality of home, culture was often the life vest. Books, movies, clothing, and ritual — they bridged the chasm between the old world and the new by taking you to the place you could no longer go.”
Will New York’s New Mayor Lead A Return To Populist Art?
“The abrupt rise of Mr. de Blasio caught much of the city’s cultural establishment off guard and set off anxious speculation about what kind of artistic patron he might be as mayor — a question that took on particular urgency because the city budget is tight.”
Lawsuit Against Calder’s Art Dealer Dismissed
“The suit claimed that Perls and his family held on to hundreds of Calder’s works, cheated the artist’s estate out of tens of millions of dollars over the course of three decades and sold fake Calder works.”
Wojciech Kilar, 81, Composer For ‘The Pianist’ And More
When Francis Ford Coppola asked the Polish composer what it took to write music like that in the movie Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Kilar cryptically replied: ‘You need to live in Katowice.'”
What Exactly Do Playwrights Do When They Reside?
“Already I’ve been using the title to open some doors. … Yet, the role itself feels delightfully and frustratingly vague.”
Sequels Ruled At The Movies This Year (Sigh)
This was a fantastic year at the box office, but “Hollywood did it largely by serving more of the same. The five leading films at the global box office were all sequels.”
Lost Van Dyck Turns Up On Antiques Roadshow (Yes, Really)
The painting “was bought for £400 by a priest in Nottingham, but experts say the restored 17th century portrait could be worth around £400,000.”