The city of Delray Beach Florida commissioned a new cultural plan, and the authors of it tout it as something new: “What’s interesting about it is that it is focused on taking the city’s inherent cultural assets and using them as building blocks in a way that addresses the always-on, experience-oriented, don’t-make-me-sit-in-a-seat-and-watch-you-perform nature of culture today. There are no cookie-cutter solutions in this report. No build a new performing arts center just like the one down the street to compete.”
Tag: 03.21.06
Will Today’s Games Change The World?
“An entire generation has grown up with a different set of games than any before it. Just watch a kid with a new videogame. The last thing they do is read the manual. Instead, they pick up the controller and start mashing buttons to see what happens. This isn’t a random process; it’s the essence of the scientific method. Through trial and error, players build a model of the underlying game based on empirical evidence collected through play. As the players refine this model, they begin to master the game world. It’s a rapid cycle of hypothesis, experiment, and analysis. And it’s a fundamentally different take on problem-solving than the linear, read-the-manual-first approach of their parents.”
UK’s Tenor Phenoms (Oh Really?)
So there are currently three tenors on the UK Top Ten charts. Or are there? “Just because somebody sings something in Italian doesn’t mean it’s opera. I suppose you could call them tenors, but don’t call them operatic tenors. Their voices are not good enough and most of the repertoire is desperate.”
Verizon Makes Deal For Programs From CBS
CBS has struck a deal with Verizon to carry the network’s programming. “The wide-ranging agreement gives Verizon’s FiOS TV the right to carry CBS’ analog and digital signals as well as video-on-demand content from CBS and its company-owned stations. Terms of the deal weren’t announced, but sources said it was likely to average upward of 50 cents per subscriber.”
UK’s Dance Think Tank
The British government is convening a think tank on dance. “Among the subjects up for discussion are education and health, employment and the relationship between the commercial and subsidised dance sector.”
The Phenomenal Rise Of YouTube
“In a few short months, the website YouTube has emerged from the obscure ranks of dozens of online viral-video outposts to dominate even giant portals in the category, including Yahoo! and Google. But its astonishing growth — streaming 30 million videos a day — also has put old-guard media empires on the defensive.”
Wanna Be Successful On Radio? What’s Your Power Ratio?
What makes a radio format successful? It’s not just the size of audience. It’s got something to do with power ratios…
Kenneth Baker Reports From Maastricht
The European Fine Art Fair is still the gold standard for art fairs. “With seven- and eight-figure prices quoted wherever I inquired, I tried to make a mantra of John Russell’s deathless line ‘No amount of money is worth a great work of art.’ But the big artistic thrills often came in modest — though not modestly priced — form, such as the Fragonard drawings shown by Agnew’s of London and New York, two rare Charles Rennie Mackintosh watercolors offered by London’s Fine Art Society…”
Queen Of Intensity
Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg got an early reputation for being impetuous, and maybe undisciplined. “Did the world have her wrong? Or, at age 45, has Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg cooled down? In the 25th year since her debut, the latter scenario isn’t true. Last week, before sciatica forced her to cancel her Lincoln Center Brahms recital, she was still trying to rehearse while loaded up on Vicodin, and her recital partner, pianist Anne-Marie McDermott, barely noticed a difference.”
A Michelangelo Show You Can’t Trust
The British Museum has a big new Michelangelo show. But only three of the drawings in the show are universally accepted as his. This forces the viewer to see the show in an entirely different way. “Why has the museum accepted 50-year-old attributions, asks Richard Dorment.”