SOS: An American Poet Is Waiting to Be Rescued
Source: Straight|Up | Published on 2014-02-22
The Anti-Corruption Drive Hits Classical Music
Source: The Great Flourishing | Published on 2014-02-22
‘My mother was a friend of Mahler’s’
Source: Slipped Disc | Published on 2014-02-23
“Ms. von Trapp was the reason the governess came to work for the family — she needed a tutor at home because she also had scarlet fever and was too ill to walk to school.”
“For Netflix users who are Comcast subscribers, the pact should mean better quality. Customers have been complaining about problems streaming Netflix videos. The online video service’s monthly tracking of Internet speeds shows a deterioration in recent months for Comcast and Verizon subscribers, though the reasons for slow-down are a matter of dispute.”
“Now I loathe and despise the media in a way I did not think possible. I used to engage with the media knowing that some of it would be adversarial, but now it’s superfluous at best and toxic at its worst.”
Gold-medal winners Davis and White “have a small window of opportunity. The Winter Olympics soon will be forgotten by general sports fans, who quickly will move on to other things, because spring training is heating up and then March Madness is right around the corner.”
“There’s a wee bit of a gap that has closed down. I remember seeing Billy Wilder being led around this exhibition of conceptual film. He was being really dismissive and saying ‘A 12-year-old could do that.’ You wouldn’t get that attitude from George Clooney, Brad Pitt or James Franco.”
The second-year producers suit up for the big game day.
“In a wise world a way might be found to have the best of both plans. The hall could be kept, along with a new office building higher than the low-ish stepped design currently proposed, which for reasons of townscape feels obliged to limbo dance beneath an invisible height limit. It could be beautiful, this coexistence of market and office building, not a compromise.”
“Those who seldom or never dine at the Four Seasons may feel estranged from an argument about the artistic integrity of a place where billionaires cluster over bluefin sashimi and roast squab with truffle sauce. But the survival of a Picasso, even a semipublic one, should concern everybody.”
One art historian: “The more wobbly things are shoved to the side. The various kinds of evidence, their status and what job they do in proving the case are never really inspected.”
The two men’s “hopes of rewriting history were dashed … when a self-posted trailer on YouTube for a documentary detailing and revealing their exploits, drew almost universal condemnation and angered Egyptian authorities.”
“Winning a prestigious award not only garners more attention for a book, but also more negative reviews.” Hunh.
“The show was initially going to be just about all the dog contests Major was entered in – including the one where he wins biggest ears in a show in south-east England – until Melody started to feel a growing sense of guilt. If she was going to force him to compete, and subject him to a judging panel, shouldn’t she put herself through a similar experience?”
“It is largely a portrait of what Ms. Callahan calls ‘unique personal style,’ or sartorially inclined ordinary folk. Recent posts include a man clad in form-fitting, head-to-toe leather, and a blonde bombshell whose off-the-shoulder dress showed off her extensively tattooed back.”
“Donna De Salvo, the museum’s chief curator and deputy director of programs, said the form is ‘extremely vital,’ offering opportunities in an art market that has become harder to penetrate. The Internet and social media allow artists to come together over many miles, and, as lines blur between disciplines, collectives fulfill the greater need for collaborations.”
“Often it’s the adults, not the children, who are badly behaved. I have seen adult audiences bristle at the arrival of a school party at the theatre, as if they resent the intrusion of young people into what they see as an adult-only arena.”
Leonard Slatkin: “When it comes to the African-American sector of the classical music workplace … there remain but a few who are in the forefront of the industry. Many attempts to alter this situation have seemed patronizing, and, in many cases, unfair.”
“Technological advances, shifting artistic values and dizzying spikes in art prices have turned the world of visual arts into a boxing ring for intellectual-property rights disputes.”
“Let me tell you about how I finally saw Schindler’s List. I planned a party—complete with wine, hummus, and Korean tacos—and sat down with seven friends to sit through three hours and 14 minutes of unrelenting horror.”
“The spy agencies call these ‘leaky apps.’ The spies collect information from among others, Google Maps, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Yahoo’s Flickr, which in turn can transmit location, buddy lists, browsing history, and more.”
The new Elaine Stritch documentary “raises familiar questions about career longevity and the innate compulsion to create.”
“Really? Why is she wearing that? Is that what astronauts wear under their spacesuits?”
“Sure, there are funding challenges, but when haven’t there been arts funding challenges? We live in a time with new technologies that can be used to enhance our art form and new technology that can be used to reach new audiences for marketing and development.”
Rising commercial rents are a threat, but “some also pointed to a recent influx of marijuana dispensaries and a resurgence in criminal activity in the area, including prostitution.”
“Her willingness to back the visions of directors such as Anderson, Jonze and Bigelow could even be said to put a 21st-century spin on the sort of cultural patronage practised in Renaissance Italy by the Medici family.”
“Have you ever seen a dancer’s feet? It’s a wonder the profession even exists. What other art form is as brutal as ballet?”
“When it comes to code breaking, ‘The Voynich is the Mount Everest of the genre and the K2 at the same time,’ said Nick Pelling, a British computer programmer who wrote a 2006 book about the manuscript and maintains a website about historical cyphers.”
For instance: Alfred, Lord Tennyson:
“Is the goal so far away?
Far, how far no tongue can say,
Let us dream our dream today.”
One large venue promoter “has promised to introduce a uniform ticket policy for disabled people who need to be accompanied by a carer after a legal challenge was launched by a wheelchair-bound customer who claimed the York Barbican had discriminated against him.”
“The bikes will be wrapped in a removable graphic paper with a design by the fair’s 2014 commissioned artist, Xu Zhen. Titled ‘Under Heaven (detail),’ the designs — based on a larger work by the artist — apply much like a decal and will be removed when the fair ends.”