Over the last two years, North America’s largest free jazz festival “has showcased Detroit’s jazz tradition alongside those of Chicago and Philadelphia. But the 2009 festival – the 30th anniversary of the event – is all about the home team.”
Tag: 01.26.09
Glass’s Akhnaten A Major Hit In Atlanta
“Friday evening, with Philip Glass’ 1984 minimalist masterpiece Akhnaten, the Atlanta Opera proved its supposedly conservative audience is willing to enter the late 20th century. It was the hottest ticket of the season, with sold out performances and great acclaim at evening’s end.”
NY City Ballet Spring Season Features Millepied Premiere, Balanchine’s Dream
“The George Balanchine ballets Coppélia and A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Peter Martins’s Romeo and Juliet will be among the highlights of the New York City Ballet’s spring season… The lineup will also include world premieres of works by Benjamin Millepied, a principal dancer with City Ballet, and Jiri Bubenicek, a principal dancer with the Dresden SemperOper Ballet.”
Madrid To Build Convention Center Covered In Solar Panels
“Designed by Mansilla+Tunon and nearly 330 feet tall, it will have six stories of convention spaces, totalling over one million square feet; its largest auditorium will seat 5,000. The building itself will be shaped like a solar lens (or the Death Star, or a golf ball, depending on your perspective).”
Better: Say It With Your Hands
“Words, of course, fail all of us from time to time; gestures hardly ever. Those small or large movements of the fingers and hands are universal, ubiquitous and usually unconscious. They say more than you think, sometimes quite literally.”
Slumdog Millionaire: Gritty Realism, Melodrama Or Fable?
Dennis Lim: “[I]t is also, by now, a movie that pre-empts debate. It comes with a built-in, catchall defense – it’s a fairy tale, and any attempt to engage with it in terms of, say, its ethics or politics gets written off as political correctness.”
The 61 Biggest Chunks Of Change Donated In ’08
The Slate 60, ranking the biggest financial donations of the year, is out for 2008, and the late Leona Helmsley — who, if you recall, hated people, loved dogs — tops the list. “In all, 13 of the 61 contributions appearing on our list (we count ties) are bequests, accounting for $11.64 billion of the $15.78 billion total.” Among the living, Michael Bloomberg is at No. 9, while David Koch is tied with Eli and Edythe Broad at 17.
On B’way, At Least, People Haven’t Had Enough Of Bush
“Will Ferrell proved one of the few bright spots last week at the Broadway box office, which saw sales at almost every production fall in the January chill. The first week of Ferrell’s ‘You’re Welcome America. A Final Night With George W Bush’ pulled in a robust $837,353 … and played to full houses.” So Broadway learns, yet again, that a star will draw crowds, no matter what.
On-Screen Smoking Ban Lifted In India
“In an obvious setback for health campaigners throughout the country, an Indian court has reversed a federal ban on showing smoking in movies and on TV. A High Court in New Delhi … said that the ban was a restriction on creative freedom. ‘The directors of films should not have multifarious authorities breathing down their necks when indulging in the creative act,’ Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul, said.”
Reed Business Lays Off Publishers Weekly’s Top Editor
“Sara Nelson, the editor in chief of Publishers Weekly, the main trade magazine to the book industry, has been laid off in a restructuring by the publication’s parent company, Reed Business Information. Ms. Nelson, 52, spent four years heading up the magazine and had become a lively presence within the industry, speaking frequently on panels and advocating forcefully for books in her weekly column.”