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- When Cutting the Cord Pays Off
Good Morning,
Watch the money this morning. Three arts institutions on two continents are rewriting survival, and none of them is doing it a traditional way. Wigmore Hall walked away from Arts Council England’s portfolio and says ticket sales are up 25% year-on-year since (The Stage). Opera Australia, $10.6 million in the red two years ago, broke even after a 29% jump at the box office (Limelight). And Sydney Dance Company, four straight deficits deep, is closing the gap by selling classes to the public (Australian Financial Review). Earned income, not grants.
Which makes the Heinz Endowments’ recent move worth a look: it’s pulling back from individual artists and one-off projects to fund organizations and infrastructure instead (WESA). The safety net is reorganizing around buildings, not people. Meanwhile the West End shows why the math is so brutal in the first place: it now costs £3 to £10 million just to raise the curtain on a musical (WhatsOnStage).
Elsewhere, jazz is taking stock of Sonny Rollins, the last man standing from “A Great Day in Harlem” (Richard Brody at the The New Yorker, Nate Chinen at The Gig).
And the virally successful Savannah Bananas now want to be Disney (The Guardian). Some empires you can see coming.
All of our stories below. See you tomorrow,
Doug
- Why The U.S. Radio Industry Opposes Year-Round Daylight Savings Time
You know how numerous radio stations have to reduce their broadcast power, and a few even have to go off the air, during non-daylight hours? Now, think about morning drive-time up north in December and January … – Inside Radio
- Knoxville Reverses Its Ban Of Alex Haley’s “Roots” From School Libraries
“Knox County Schools Superintendent Jon Rysewyk said the district will return the (Pulitzer-winning) 1976 novel to school library shelves, walking back a decision that (led to) … weeks of community backlash, board member pressure, and statewide criticism.” – Tennessee Lookout
- Miles Davis’ “Kind Of Blue” Is The Best-Selling Jazz Album Of All Time. He Thought It Was A Failure
When I tell people that I missed what I was trying to do on Kind of Blue, that I missed getting the exact sound of the African finger piano up in that sound, they just look at me like I’m crazy. – The Conversation
- Eyewitness Memory Is Unreliable. Or Is It?
The science of memory has been shifting. A re-evaluation of real-world criminal cases and laboratory experiments suggests that an eyewitness’s confidence in a specific memory can be a strong indicator of the veracity of their account, at least in certain circumstances. – Nature
- Spanish Government Demands Audit Of Reina Sofia Museum Collections
Spain’s government is turning up the pressure on the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía over longstanding problems tied to its collection inventory, with lawmakers threatening consequences that could ultimately cost museum director Manuel Segade his job. – ARTnews
- Facing Serious Cash Crunch, Sydney Dance Company Builds Up Its Teaching Offerings
Despite reaching new artistic heights, Australia’s leading contemporary dance troupe has posted four annual deficits in a row, totaling $5.2 million (US$3.7 million) and attributable mostly to the higher running costs of its revamped headquarters. Luckily, paying students are flocking to SDC’s new classes. – Australian Financial Review
- Sonny Rollins As Revolutionary Force
Some musicians evolve, others effect personal revolutions. Rollins is in the latter category, and his work bears the shuddering force of his drastic, self-imposed transitions. To hear Rollins in the late fifties is to hear the lion roar. – The New Yorker
- Movie Box Office Memorial Day Weekend Disaster Averted
Studio insiders told TheWrap they were projecting $190 million for the four-day weekend, well below last year’s holiday weekend of $330 million. But Monday estimates have the overall box office coming in at $222 million, just below the $223 million recorded in 2022, the year of “Top Gun: Maverick.” – The Wrap (Yahoo)
- The Savannah Banana Phenomenon: What It’s Becoming
The Disney comparison is not necessarily a coincidence. Multiple players mention an overlap between Disney fandom (including Disney adults) and bananaball fandom, and Jesse Cole, founder of the Bananas, identifies Walt Disney as a key influence. – The Guardian
- You Couldn’t Design A More Anti-News Internet If You Tried
It’s like an invisible tax levied on our communities that we pay civically, cognitively and sometimes even literally, in the form of higher local bond prices due to more wasteful government spending. Increasingly, this invisible tax is being silently levied by Big Tech. – NiemanLab
- Heinz Endowments Changes Priorities In Its Arts Funding Grants
The Pittsburgh-based foundation is ending grants for one-time projects and for individual artists in favor of funding arts organizations and cultural infrastructure in the region. – WESA (Pittsburgh)
- Spotify: Our AI Pivot Is Better Than Slop
Spotify’s chief executive has defended the company’s move into AI-generated music, claiming it offers users and creators a better alternative to piracy and unregulated AI slop. – The Guardian
- A 2018 Fire Destroyed 80 Percent Of Brazil’s National Museum Collection. It’s Working To Rebuild
The fire on September 2, 2018, began with an electrical issue, but it spiraled out of control when the hydrants next to the building proved to be dry. According to a 160-page report, the museum had been chronically underfunded for years, and a whistleblower had warned of fire risk as early as 2004. – Smithsonian
- Remembering Sonny Rollins
He was the last of the Mohicans1 — an essential piece of jazz’s midcentury-modern picture, the only surviving subject in Art Kane’s iconic yearbook photograph A Great Day in Harlem. But longevity is just one factor at play. – The Gig (Nate Chinen)
- Opera Australia Has Turned Its Troubled Finances Around
After posting an operating loss of $10.6 million (US$7.6 million) in 2024, the company — boosted by a 29% increase in ticket sales — posted a small net operating deficit and, after a contribution from the Opera Australia Capital Fund, broke even for 2025. – Limelight (Australia)
- The Heroic Effort To Rebuild Brazil’s National Museum, Almost Completely Destroyed In A Fire
“The news arrived (in September 2025) with both excitement and a pang of grief: The oldest national history museum in the Americas was slated to partially (and temporarily) reopen for the first time since a 2018 fire destroyed more than 16 million objects — 80 percent of its collections.” – Smithsonian Magazine
- Jazz Pianist John Eaton, Evangelist For Great American Songbook, Has Died At 91
“Across a more-than-six-decade playing career, he recorded albums for the Chiaroscuro label, took requests from Nancy Reagan at the White House, delighted audiences at Wolf Trap and maintained a long-running association with the Smithsonian Institution, delivering song-filled lectures on American music that were broadcast around the country.” – The Washington Post (Yahoo!)
- Behind The Scenes At Second City, Watching A New Show Get Made
“What people don’t know about the process is that when the old cast is done, on their final day, usually a Sunday, the new cast comes in on a Tuesday,” director Carisa Barreca says. “That night, the new cast has to put up a show — the old show.” – WBEZ (Chicago)
- What It Costs These Days To Produce A Show In London’s West End
“Mounting a play in the West End now requires between £1 million and £2 million pounds in upfront investment, while staging a musical requires between £3 million and £10 million. This is before weekly costs” — £120,000 to £200,000 before royalties for a play and £300,000 to £400,000 for a musical. – WhatsOnStage (UK)
- Barn At Oscar Hammerstein II’s Pennsylvania Farmstead Collapses In Storm
Highland Farm, just outside Doylestown in Bucks County, was where Hammerstein wrote the words for many of the musicals he created with Richard Rodgers. It is now the site of the Oscar Hammerstein Museum and Theatre Education Center, which plans to rebuild the barn as an exhibition space and education center. – PhillyVoice
- Since It Gave Up Government Funding, Finances At London’s Wigmore Hall Are Stronger Than Ever
The city’s most respected chamber music venue has seen a 25% increase year-on-year in ticket sales since it left the funding portfolio of Arts Council England, artistic director John Gilhooly said. – The Stage
- “The World’s Greatest Orchestra” — Take Two: Today’s Metropolitan Opera
- How The Cherokee Bible Reveals Differences Between European And Native American Worldviews
One can learn quite a bit by noticing which English words and phrases had no Cherokee equivalent — and in how translators chose to render those words and phrases in Cherokee. – The Conversation
- Why Has The World Stopped Making Babies?
Some blame technology, particularly smartphones and social media. Others blame a kind of 21st-century weltschmerz—a sadness about the state of the world and our uncertain future in it. – The Atlantic
- How The Big Art Auction Houses Engineered Their Roaring Comeback
“The houses leaned into spectacle — including a promotional video featuring Nicole Kidman dancing around a bronze Brancusi head — and prearranged deals … that reduced their risk. The result was a season with a few flashy records — and … a broader return to deliberate bidding, quality material and logical prices.” – The New York Times
- CBS Paramount Drops Copyright Claim Against Colbert After Parody Show
CBS and parent company Paramount have backed away from efforts to limit reposting of Stephen Colbert’s mock appearance as host of a Michigan public access show called “Only In Monroe.” Colbert posted the hour-long parody a day after being ousted from his nearly 11-year-long run at “The Late Show.” – NPR
- Colleges Are Hemorrhaging Student Enrollment. One Oregon College Hits The Wall
According to the plan released, “We are maintaining an infrastructure built for 30,000 students while currently serving 20,000.” Other options “have been exhausted” and “incrementalism” has failed, it says. – InsideHigherEd
- Paris’ Pont Neuf Becomes A Stone Grotto
French artist JR has taken over Paris’s Pont Neuf—the oldest bridge over the Seine, and the city’s first built from stone, not wood. JR’s hotly awaited hometown installation La Caverne du Pont Neuf (2026) measures 120 meters long, 20 meters wide, and, in some spots, 18 meters tall. – Artnet
- What’s Missing From Dance Funding In The U.S.? Here’s What One Of The Leading Dance Funders Says.
Ashley Ferro-Murray of the Doris Duke Foundation: I’m interested in … funding resilient models for the future as well as legacy models that … value the labor of the artist. One way the Doris Duke Foundation is doing this is by combining our grant-making capacity with other resources like marketing and communications. – Dance Magazine
- 4,500-year-old Structure Recreated Close To Stonehenge
Reaching more than 20 feet in height, the hall was built over the course of nine months by a team of more than 100 volunteers who relied on the tools and techniques of their Neolithic ancestors. – Artnet
- What Impact Does Free Admission Make On Museums?
“What we have seen, across the country, is that institutions that have eliminated admissions have generally not seen an increase in visitation in any meaningful way,” says Daniel Weiss. – The Art Newspaper
- Gandhi And His Notion Of Micro- And Macro-Morality
Gandhi demonstrated that micro-morality is essential, but not good enough. We have to be morally good people used to looking inside and judging what we do before we do it, but also people who look seriously at the flawed systems that surround us and think about what we can do to oppose them. – 3 Quarks Daily
- James Will Be Leading A Different Kind Of Murdoch Media Empire
“One New York staffer said that, in contrast to other billionaires who have purchased media properties in recent years, James Murdoch has ‘actually been in the media business for a long time. It’s not like he’s just coming in new to it as like a fun trophy or novelty.’” – The Washington Post (MSN)
- Maybe We’re Thinking About Ecosystems The Wrong Way
Why do we keep thinking ecosystems have functions they could fail to perform? – Aeon
