Publisher Theodore Presser, which has been selling music for almost 250 years, says it will begin issuing scores on CD-ROM. The first 15 CD-ROMs include the complete piano solos of Beethoven, Brahms, Chopin, Mozart, Schumann. By the end of 2002, the company plans to sell a series of 110 disks – cost: about $15 each. – Chicago Tribune
Tag: 07.20.00
CONDUCTOR-HUNTING
- Now that Riccardo Muti has turned down the job as music director of the New York Philharmonic, speculation turns to other candidates, with Pittsburgh’s Mariss Jansons a leading candidate. Or might it be Christoph Eschenbach? – Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
THE BOSTON CONDUCTOR SURVIVOR CHALLENGE
Who will replace Seiji Ozawa as Boston Symphony music director? “It’s Episode One of WGBH-TV’s new reality show, “Symphony Survivor.” Ten conductors, armed with nothing more than the white-tie-and-tails on their backs, their batons and their cell phones, are about to be locked inside Symphony Hall for nine weeks.” – Boston Herald
RIGHT TO ALTER
When Charles M. Schulz retired from drawing “Peanuts” he said no one else would ever draw the cartoon. But some recent repeats of the strip have been altered adding current events references. So when is it okay to change the work of a deceased artist? – Intellectual Capital
USHERING IN THE TRUTH
Want to know the real theatre scoop? Talk to the people who see it all – the ushers. “Indeed, perhaps no one has seen the changes in theatre-and by extension, some of the cultural shifts in the society at large-more vividly than those doughty black-clad ushers who’ve been moving up and down the aisles, flashlights in hand, for the long haul. – Backstage
REAL REALITY?
“Though it was never a part of the show’s design, ‘Big Brother’ is broadcasting in prime time many of the unresolved fears that stretch across the nation’s racial divide. The series already is being labeled groundbreaking television, with the raw footage captured by the cameras that film around the clock generating heated discussions in cafes and Internet chat rooms across the country.” – Los Angeles Times
WASHINGTON DEBUT
Newly-named Kennedy Center director Michael Kaiser “was presented to the press, patrons and politicians yesterday, capped by a bipartisan dinner in the Capitol’s Statuary Hall hosted by the four leaders of Congress. The accolades were lavish; in turn, the new arts center president promised to stay in the job for at least five years, which would be ‘longer than I’ve ever been anywhere.'” – Washington Post
DEAD CULTURE OR DEAD CRITICS?
“Culture as this particular academic knows it is dead, buried, reincarnated only to walk the earth as a movie remake based on the original sitcom. The problem isn’t dummy art or the proliferation of immoral pop culture, or even a house of mirrors assembly-line media. The problem resides in the inability of the majority of those who comment on the arts – journalists, academics, professional artists, producers, editors, information-age cultural critics – to come to terms with emerging new ways of living with and through mass culture. – The Globe and Mail (Canada)
EXPRESSION VS SUPPRESSION
Korea’s artists, civic groups, and courts are struggling through a morass of mixed opinions over what’s considered art, and thus protected as free expression, and what’s deemed obscene. Two of the country’s recent decisions: the release of the popular movie “Lies” was postponed six months due to press outrage over its sexual plotline. And this week Korea’s premier cartoonist was fined $2.6 million for “encouraging misbehavior in minors” in his strip. – Korea Herald
HOW MANY BANKERS DO YOU REALLY NEED?
Does Australia have too many students pursuing arts degrees? “A Centre for Independent Studies report says universities are producing too many arts and social science graduates, who lack employable skills.” – The Australian