The cultural cognoscenti love to draw comparisons between art, music, and theatre patrons who are in it for the love of the form, and those who show up mainly for social reasons, or simply to get themselves noticed by other “arts people.” But is there any real truth to this longstanding legend of the self-interested patron? According to a new study which focuses on why people attend cultural events, the legend is true, to a degree. “The most common major motivation claimed by respondents for attending any or all arts events over the last 12 months was wanting to socialize with friends and family, followed by having an emotionally rewarding experience and gaining knowledge.” But arts organizations might want to take note of the study’s other finding: attendees are rarely completely satisfied with the experience.
Tag: 11.20.05
Royal Opera Quits Blackface
Covent Garden has abandoned a long-established practice of black-face portrayals on stage. “The Royal Opera has been forced into a last-minute U-turn over the casting of a white mezzo-soprano in the role of a black woman. Stephanie Blythe was blacked up during rehearsals of Un Ballo in Maschera (The Masked Ball), but when the production opened at Covent Garden last Thursday her skin colour was its natural white. The company said it made the change because of the need to be ‘sensitive to issues such as racism’. In doing so it overruled the production’s director, Italian film-maker Mario Martone, who was informed just hours before the curtain went up – and did not agree with the decision.”
MacMillan: Populism Is Killing Serious Music
Is classical music dying a quiet death in Scotland? Composer James MacMillan fears it may be so, and the evidence goes far beyond the dismal state of the temporarily shuttered Scottish Opera. “The de-sacralisation of our world, so enthusiastically cultivated by the new ruling elites, stands at a polar opposite from the potential for transcendence claimed by classical music. In that sense, the battles for serious music are part of a wider culture war apparent at various levels of modern Scotland. What is it about serious music that offends the triumphalistic trendies basking in the apparent victories of a demystified popular culture?”
Dumbing Down Music Ed
Is James MacMillan overstating the impact of pop culture on classical music? A glance at the latest standards for music education in Scotland would seem to suggest he is not. “The new Higher music syllabus… misses out key components that are essential for preparing pupils for serious careers in music. In the new curriculum, musical literacy is optional while listening papers have changed from deep analytical essays of musical scores to multiple-choice exercises.”
Living The Hard-Knock Life Of A Rockette
Think being a Rockette looks like fun? Suppose it’s a life full of glamor and adulation for those unbelievably athletic high-steppers who have come to symbolize the entire Radio City Christmas Spectacular? Well, maybe it is, particularly if you consider blown knees, ice-water baths, and sweat-stained leotards to be glamorous.
Mackerras at 80: What’s Left To Do?
Sir Charles Mackerras turned 80 while standing on the podium of the Royal Opera House this weekend, and while he is by no means alone in the ranks of living octogenarian conductors, there is little question that the career he has built in his six decades in the music business is the envy of the orchestral world. What makes Mackerras almost unique among conductors is his diversity of interests: “[perhaps no] other conductor has acquired quite so many specialties or put them into practice with so many ensembles.”
Looking Up From Rock Bottom
“The Colorado Ballet has a tough challenge ahead as it tries to a climb out of a financial hole and regain the splintered trust of contributors and audiences. The company, which marks its 45th anniversary this season, suffered a 2004-05 deficit of $341,000 and accumulated debt totaling $700,000. As of Wednesday, it owed $439,000 alone to the city of Denver for rental fees and other production expenses. Perhaps even more damaging has been a steady stream of negative publicity, [which] reached a climax in October, when the company fired 19-year artistic director Martin Fredmann… So far, at least the company’s artistry has not suffered during the current crisis, but can that stability continue?”
Now That’s A Cool Boss
The chief conductor of Iran’s Tehran Symphony Orchestra has resigned from his position and left the country in protest of what he says is the unconscionably low pay afforded to the orchestra’s musicians. TSO musicians earn approximately $90 a month. Conductor Ali Rahbari announced his decision to leave the orchestra to the audience at last week’s concert, less than six months after he was appointed to the post.
Cooperative Architecture
Benjamin Forgey says that Renzo Piano’s expansion of Atlanta’s High Museum of Art is a resounding architectural success largely because Piano resisted the urge to make the project all about him. Instead, Piano’s expansion built methodically on what the High’s original architect, Richard Meier, had done, and the result was “the complex equivalent of a friendly handshake — not awfully exciting, but satisfying in myriad ways. A sensible, sensitive, low-key sort of triumph, then.”
The New Old Getty
The Getty Villa’s makeover is complete. “The addition operates like an anti-icon. As a means of disguising its bulk, it burrows into the canyon walls that rise on the edge of the site. The carefully choreographed and richly textured pathways that lead, rather indirectly, from a new parking garage to the galleries are lined by high walls faced in horizontal layers of concrete, red porphyry stone, travertine and bronze. They are meant to suggest the striated walls of a huge archeological dig that has unearthed, of all things, the 1974 villa. The overall effect is one of tasteful refinement and restraint — so much so that the architecture, at times, brings to mind a Calvin Klein boutique al fresco.”