“The three great Salinger mysteries: 1) Has he been writing? 2) What will become of what he’s written after his death? (He doesn’t seem inclined to publish anything before then.) And, finally: 3) If it exists, how good is it?”
Tag: 06.05.09
Long-Closed Rijksmuseum Still Doesn’t Have An Opening Date
“This whole system of reinstallation and rebuilding and reopening, again and again new opening dates, means that the world is changing. Technical things are changing, security measures are changing, the way we look at art is changing … You can’t make a plan in 2003 and keep it stable 100 per cent for, let’s say, 10 years.”
London’s Half-Price Ticket Booth Will Start Selling Advance Tickets
“Tkts is the West End’s only official theatre booth, which has been operating since 1980. It has its main booth in Leicester Square, and another outlet in Brent Cross shopping centre.”
League Of Composers Starts An Orchestra
“At a time when other arts organizations are struggling to stay afloat and in many cases curtailing their activities, starting an orchestra and handing out commissions may seem counterintuitive, if not perilous. But these bold endeavors show an old, established organization undergoing profound changes to ensure a viable future.”
“Reality” TV Takes On Musical Prodigies (Erg!)
“It’s cruel to feed a child’s delusions of grandeur, when what he desperately needs is a reality-check. But, unfortunately, “reality” television has other priorities.”
Study: Practice Makes Perfect? Not Exactly…
“Practice, if simply viewed as repetition, does not make perfect but merely permanent,” notes the report, published in the journal Psychology of Music. In contrast, the authors assert, “Individual attention to novel distinctions and subtle nuances appears to alter the process of creative ensemble performance and lead to music that is more enjoyable to perform and hear.”
Ulysses Sale Sets Record
A rare copy of James Joyce’s epic novel Ulysses has been sold for £275,000 ($486,000) the highest price ever paid for a 20th-century first edition.
Inventor Of The Internet: We Really Don’t Understand What The Web Has Become
“The web is now a massive system of connected people and technology and we have to study it as one. It connects people as they make and follow hyperlinks to a degree that results in complex properties no one expected. It has something like 1011 web pages in it and there are a similar number of neurons in the brain. The brain is something very complicated we don’t understand – yet we rely on it. The web is very complicated too and, though we built it, we have no real data about the stability of the emergent systems that have cropped up on it.”
Hollywood Tourism Down
“Every day, visitors from around the world flock to the hot sites of Hollywood, the historic birthplace of America’s entertainment industry. But so far this year, the crowds are thinner, tourist spending is down and merchants are nervous.”
Grammys Try To Prove Relevance – Eliminate Polka Category
“Along with axing the polka trophy, the academy also decided to fold the best Latin urban album category into the best Latin rock or alternative album one, creating an omnibus trophy. The board also voted to split the best contemporary folk/Americana album award into two separate prizes and rename the entire folk field ‘American roots music’.”