“The Phoenix Symphony is facing serious legal challenges arising from its alleged mistreatment of many of its most talented musicians. These legal challenges involve lawsuits, complaints to federal agencies, charges of wrongful termination, allegations of retaliation, and the charge that the symphony’s top, veteran players are being forced to take demotions or leave the symphony so they can be replaced with younger, more compliant players.”
Tag: 03.23.09
‘Unputdownable’ – What Book Blurbs Are Trying To Obscure
“What all this [hype] is really about is trying to sidestep the reality that books are pretty useless to us. They don’t keep us warm (unless you finally fling that unputdownable freak in the fire), they don’t feed us, they wreck our environment by costing trees, and sometimes they’re plain poisonous.”
Phoenix Symphony Embroiled In Legal Tangles Over Personnel
“These legal challenges involve lawsuits, complaints to federal agencies, charges of wrongful termination, allegations of retaliation, and the charge that the symphony’s top, veteran players are being forced to take demotions or leave the symphony so they can be replaced with younger, more compliant players.”
(Good) Music Aids Recovery In Stroke Patients
“Music was the best medicine for four stroke victims whose cognitive impairments lessened while listening to songs they loved. The music stimulated neurological pleasure centers adjacent to damaged brain regions, apparently producing a therapeutic crossover effect.” (Kenny Rogers worked best, it seems.)
Australia’s PM Dismisses Sydney Opera House Revamp
“Plans to upgrade the interior of the Sydney Opera House appear doomed after Kevin Rudd baulked at sharing the $1 billion [Aus] cost with the NSW Government. […] While conceding that he was open to being persuaded about the job-creation opportunities of the proposal, Mr Rudd said the money could be better spent elsewhere.”
Ann Arbor’s Daily Paper To Shut Down
“The Ann Arbor News will close in July after publishing as the city’s daily newspaper since 1835, publisher Laurel Champion announced today. […] A new Web-based media company called AnnArbor.com LLC will be launched later this year. In addition to publishing continuously online, AnnArbor.com will publish a print edition twice a week.”
Paintings For Heroin: Addict Stole Art From Yale, Cops Say
According to police, a 53-year-old heroin addict “ripped off 39 paintings from New Haven venues, including $40,000 in art from Yale’s Slifka Center and the New Haven Free Public Library. The paintings were recovered during a weekend bust on a Hill area home, where a second man, age 47, had been allegedly accepting the art in exchange for bags of heroin.” A detective said: “These were not hardened criminals. They have drug habits.”
Liverpool Aims To Maintain Its Cultural Momentum
“A programme of more than 100 free events are to be held in Liverpool to build on the success of its year as European Capital of Culture. The 2009 plans include the On The Waterfront festival to reflect the city’s connection to New York and a public art event in the winter. … The 2008 culture year is estimated to have generated about £800m for the regional economy.”
Product-Placement Model May Be Key For Online Shorts
“While the very phrase ‘product placement’ elicits jeers and hisses in the TV and movie worlds, on the web something surprising has been happening: Branded content is emerging as not just a promising way to make money, but as creatively viable as well. … [I]n some cases, the show can be the brainchild of the advertiser itself.”
Why Is What Women Want A Mystery To Hollywood?
“In a marketing culture so perfectly calibrated that experts can predict what’s in our fridge by the car we drive, why is it that what women want in a movie is still considered mysterious? We clearly aren’t unreadable consumers (Seriously. They know what milk you buy), so it’s odd that every woman I know has a movie appetite that includes more than ‘chick flicks’ (though we love those too), when for years nobody seemed to know it.”