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Scott Timberg on Creative Destruction

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Is Opera Really “Dead”?

November 10, 2014 by Scott Timberg

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="bkv13k1YwsUOJ9oOZ89GQDYLY1wM0rF3"] WELL, of course it's not, but another story has gone up recently arguing that the entire art form is finished. The focus of the piece is that the opera repertoire has been stuck in the 19th century for way too long -- that it doesn't move forward, with new work, anymore. That would indeed be damning, but looking closer, we see that … [Read more...]

“Dido” and “Bluebeard” at LA Opera

November 3, 2014 by Scott Timberg

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="AkwrwxM6eGKNL3GVzj0NAKOSml0rfK6D"] YOUR humble blogger came out of a performance of Duke Bluebeard's Castle yesterday reminded of what a bloody genius Bela Bartok was -- and I mean that just about literally. The production at Los Angeles Opera is brutally sharp, filled with sexual menace. The swelling, at times astringent music itself offered a dark kind of beauty to … [Read more...]

Jeremy Denk Responds re The Classical Style

July 1, 2014 by Scott Timberg

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="Lz4IkluPYlxFQWA9NEkxhgYseWGqugC1"] MUSICOLOGISTS will already have seen this, but the rest may enjoy this defense from pianist Jeremy Denk, who conceived and wrote the libretto for The Classical Style (An Opera of Sorts.) The opera was performed last month at the Ojai Music Festival. I was one of a handful who were frustrated by it. Another was Los Angeles … [Read more...]

The Trouble With Opera

June 30, 2014 by Scott Timberg

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="wZSGDJOmSbhvFKacaUaPFIlOS5DNnjBE"] IS it more prominent than ever, or disappearing from American eyes and ears? It may be some of both, in a time in which opera is played in movie theaters and opera companies struggle to survive. An aptly ambivalent story by Mark Swed in the Los Angeles Times looks at the strange predicament of American opera in 2014. Things were … [Read more...]

A Dissent on “The Classical Style”

June 19, 2014 by Scott Timberg

AS I posted the other day, this year’s Ojai Music Festival was full of good stuff. But there was one piece that frustrated me: The new opera, The Classical Style, which was for many the highlight of the weekend. Why did it drive me crazy? The Classical Style: An Opera (of Sorts) is the first opera commissioned in the seven-decade history of the festival; it’s based on a well-regarded book by … [Read more...]

Massenet’s “Thais” at LA Opera

June 4, 2014 by Scott Timberg

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="GYlAzT4O3lEomZ10GqKrQmACXiv7ZjHE"] WHAT kind of love is the truest and most enduring, spiritual or erotic? That’s a theme that echoes through the opera I saw the other day. My experience with Massenet is limited, so I have little sense of what to expect. But Thais, which stars Placido Domingo as an earnest and confused fourth-century monk seeking out an Alexandrian … [Read more...]

Will Kickstarter Save Culture? And, Curvy Divas

May 22, 2014 by Scott Timberg

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="OipGQdl5st5HpgJ16uvOZV10yHar99su"] WE'RE now five years past the launch of Kickstarter, and some culture hounds, a new Telegraph article says, refer to the eras "BK" and "AK" -- Before and After Kickstarter. What has it done for arts and culture projects? The story takes stock of the good and bad, and comes down mostly on the good the crowdfunding has done. It's been … [Read more...]

Can Impulse Records Come Back? Plus, Shakespeare’s Acting

April 24, 2014 by Scott Timberg

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="BkttmRWC0b2xNNu3idGGaZviRdyibZxn"] ONE of the most storied of all jazz labels, Impulse -- "The House Trane Built" -- may provide that rarest of things: Good news for the jazz world. In hibernation for a while, and decades from its leadership of the avant-garde in the '60s, Impulse is being revived and will begin releasing new music. Now part of Universal Music … [Read more...]

Trouble With iTunes, and More On San Diego Opera

April 11, 2014 by Scott Timberg

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="QbQ1AU6Xrnco2mhImRDlqE6xwuPHZulj"] WHEN it comes to the collapsing sales of recorded music, and subsequent loss of revenues for musicians, I go back and forth between blaming the record labels for dropping the ball, and seeing the revolution of digital music as relentless and unstoppable. Either way, musicians have been the prime casualty. But it looks like one of … [Read more...]

The Roots of “Noah,” and More on San Diego Opera

April 1, 2014 by Scott Timberg

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="C9NSdernwV8X41Rw5BV3m3kxC3W8iYky"] THE movie Noah was directed by one of the most talented filmmakers of my generation. He can also be one of the most erratic. I got to hang out a bit with Darren Aronofsky about a decade ago when he was following up his debut, Pi, with Requiem for Dream. He had a reputation even then for being difficult and stubborn, but he came across … [Read more...]

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Scott Timberg

I'm a longtime culture writer and editor based in Los Angeles; my book "CULTURE CRASH: The Killing of the Creative Class" came out in 2015. My stories have appeared in The New York Times, Salon and Los Angeles magazine, and I was an LA Times staff writer for six years. I'm also an enthusiastic if middling jazz and indie-rock guitarist. (Photo by Sara Scribner) Read More…

Culture Crash, the Book

My book came out in 2015, and won the National Arts & Entertainment Journalism Award. The New Yorker called it "a quietly radical rethinking of the very nature of art in modern life"

I urge you to buy it at your favorite independent bookstore or order it from Portland's Powell's.

Culture Crash

Here is some information on my book, which Yale University Press published in 2015. (Buy it from Powell's, here.) Some advance praise: With coolness and equanimity, Scott Timberg tells what in less-skilled hands could have been an overwrought horror story: the end of culture as we have known … [Read More...]

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