“This past week, Velveteria added a new portrait of Caitlyn Jenner following her highly publicized gender transition. Baldwin likes to stay on top of the news and pop culture, frequently commissioning works from established velvet painters he has come to know in Tijuana and Juarez, Mexico.”
Tag: 06.12.15
The Woman Who Runs Wolf Trap Opera Company
“Kim Witman, 58, is celebrating her 30th year at the Wolf Trap Opera. When she started in 1985, she was a coach, new to the opera world, playing for rehearsals and earning intern-level pay. And even now that she’s leading the company — her official title is senior director of the Wolf Trap Opera and classical programming at Wolf Trap — no job at the center is beneath her. She does a lot of things that many general directors don’t do: accompanying singers, making casting and repertoire choices, and, yes, blogging.”
Synonyms And Metaphors – Should Dance Be About Something?
“George Balanchine, the greatest choreographer in the art, believed that ballet needed no external subject to give it meaning: We can’t dance synonyms, he liked to say. But one major part of the history of ballet, of course, is a history of attempts at various synonyms.”
That Moment In An Opera Performance When You Realize Your Star Is Going Down And You Scramble For The Understudy…
“While he was literally going voiceless on the stage, I was looking into the wings to see if they were telling me to bring the curtain down, because of course I had no communication with anybody,” says conductor Jonathan Darlington, who had the orchestra with him on stage rather than in the pit.
Marginalized LA Dodgers Organist Retires In Frustration (Then Unretires After A Quick Phone Call)
The longest-tenured stadium musician in Los Angeles sports history confirmed that at the end of her 27th year as Dodgers organist, she would be unhappily walking away
Why Ornette Coleman Mattered
“To working musicians whose sense of form and craft were deeply ingrained—and whose personal artistry and place in the profession were built on improvising on the harmonies of songs—Coleman, for all his lyrical inventiveness and rhythmic drive, was a threat. Jazz could suddenly dispense with their techniques—and when Coleman became an instant succès de scandale, battle lines and generational lines were drawn.”
Kinda Sorta REALLY Creepy – Festival Using Facial Recognition Software To Scan Audience Faces
“Strategically placed cameras will scan faces at the Download Festival site in Donnington before comparing [them] with a database of custody images from across Europe. It is one of the first times it has been trialled outside, normally it is done in a controlled environment. There has been a lot of interest from other festivals and they are saying: ‘If it works, can we borrow it?’”