“The New York Philharmonic reached into its family tree and plucked Alan Gilbert, the 40-year-old son of two Philharmonic musicians, as its next music director, making him the first native New Yorker in the position and a rare American in the job. Philharmonic officials also said they would appoint an elder statesman, Riccardo Muti, 65, to serve in a supporting role equivalent to principal guest conductor.”
Tag: 07.17.07
Urban Universities On A Starvation Diet
America’s urban public universities are being starved for resources. “Many of our urban secondary schools are abysmal, it’s true. Equally unjustifiable, but perhaps no surprise, is that urban institutions of higher education have begun to endure challenges and inequities that mirror those faced by our feeder schools and districts.”
Warner Decides Not To Buy EMI
Warner Music Group Corp. said on Tuesday it decided against bidding for rival EMI Group Plc, two days before a deadline to submit an offer.
Harry Pirated To The Web
“On Tuesday, scanned pages of what may be the entire text of “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” were circulating among Web users. A separate link displayed what the site claimed to be a seven-page epilogue and the table of contents from ‘Deathly Hallows,’ coming out July 21 under ultra-tight security.”
Stratford Canada Renames…
“The Stratford Festival of Canada is restoring the word Shakespeare to its name in a bid to cement its image as North America’s leading classical repertory theatre. Beginning in November, the theatre festival in the southwestern Ontario town of Stratford will be known as the Stratford Shakespeare Festival.”
Fans Versus The Critics
Fans and critics frequently disagree. The tension between them, more acute than ever in the Internet age, seems ripe for exploration. So what exactly is a critic to do?
Guthrie Theatre Expands Big And Wins At Box Office
Minneapolis’ Guthrie Theatre saw its budget rise 30 percent this season. “The Guthrie met that challenge by increasing the number of performances among three stages (and Dowling said he will add 90 more performances in the next year) and by fundraising. Ticket income rose 26 percent, to $10 million, while contributions shot up 59 percent, to about $8.5 million.”
Pasadena A.D. Wins Award For Diversifying Audience
Pasadena Playhouse artistic director Sheldon Epps has won a $125,000 Leadership Award from the James Irvine Foundation. “The citation noted that Epps, ‘one of the few African American artistic directors of a major regional theater in the country,’ has succeeded since 1997 in engineering a ‘remarkable renaissance’ in which the Pasadena Playhouse has increased its audience while diversifying it by age and race.”
A U.S. Rarity, Cortona Canvas Finds Home At LACMA
“Pietro da Cortona’s ‘St. Martina,’ a luminous image of a martyred young woman by an artist best known for his vast allegorical fresco on the ceiling of the Palazzo Barberini in Rome, was a gift of the Ahmanson Foundation. J. Patrice Marandel, the museum’s curator of European paintings and sculpture, said the gift fulfills his wish to add ‘some heavy hitters, some big, big names’ to LACMA’s substantial holding of Baroque paintings.”
Comic Books, A Pop-Cult Stealth Hit
All appearances to the contrary, “sales of comic books have been increasing steadily for the last five years. And that doesn’t just include graphic novels–the perfect-bound trade paperbacks that have become the default format for the medium. Diamond Comic Distributors Inc., the company that has a practical monopoly on comics distribution, has seen improving figures in almost all formats. What’s strange about this grim reprieve for the industry is that it is so hard to see in the popular culture.”