“Groups representing songwriters, music publishers, record labels and digital music websites have ended a seven-year dispute over two types of music royalties. Unfortunately, neither of those is the controversial performance royalty for Internet radio.”
Author: Matthew Westphal
Salonen Begins His Philharmonia Tenure in Triumph
“The programme was just the sort that brings out the best in him: three early 20th-century pieces full of sharp orchestral colours, jagged rhythms and pulsating energy, with not a trace of Romantic ‘inwardness’.”
The Difficulty of Being Lionel Trilling
“‘I have one of the great reputations in the academic world,’ he wrote in his journal after being promoted to full professor in the Columbia English Department, in 1948. ‘This thought makes me retch.'”
Green Gables Author Committed Suicide
The granddaughter of Lucy Maud Montgomery writes, “What has never been revealed is that [she] took her own life at the age of 67 through a drug overdose. I wasn’t told the details of what happened, and I never saw the note she left, but I do know that it asked for forgiveness.”
Play That Funky Alphorn, Swiss Girl
Eliana Burki, a 25-year-old who sports miniskirts and a nose piercing, plays jazz and funk (with full rhythm section) on an instrument usually associated with Alpine garb and cowbells.
The Last Stand of Physical Media?
Betting that many listeners still want to buy music on some sort of physical medium, the four major labels and flash drive giant SanDisk have unveiled “slotMusic” – recordings on flash memory cards that can be slipped into MP3 players and mobile phones. (Except for Apple iPods and iPhones.)
Be Your Own Virtual Karl Rove
A new game called Political Machine Express, available as a free download, lets players run virtual versions of the Obama-Biden vs. McCain-Palin campaign. “Much of the actual political process has made the transition into the game intact: You’ll give speeches, take a stand on a candidate’s real issues and juggle the costs of running a campaign while securing enough attention and support to win.”
Life Magazine to Rise Again, This Time Online
Life.com, a joint venture between Time, Inc. and Getty Images, “is scheduled to launch in the first quarter of 2009 with 6 million images from the LIFE archive… It will add about 3,000 new images a day from Getty Images, which will feed most of its editorial images onto the new site.”
“Naked Clowns Are Coming to Haunt Your Dreams”
“Graduates of San Francisco’s Clown Conservatory Class of 2008 have stripped down to their birthday suits to make a 2009 Naked Clown Calendar.”
Toto, I Don’t Think We’re in the Bronx Anymore
“What might [the first break dancers] make of Break Out, the Korean dance-comedy spectacle now having its North American debut at the Union Square Theater? I’m still trying to figure out what to make of it myself.”