My client David Lang has two dance projects coming up this fall, one with New York City Ballet and the other with Works & Process at the Guggenheim. This means I've been doing a lot of reaching out to dance writers I've never met or worked with before, so far with absolutely no (0) success, but I persevere!You should know that I think the New York Times website is basically The Most Impressive Thing (as it should be); minutes after we learned that George Steinbrenner passed away this morning, the Times had a slideshow of archival photos of … [Read more...]

From yesterday's New York Times article, "Loophole May Have Aided Theft of Classified Data":The soldier accused of downloading a huge trove of secret data from military computers in Iraq appears to have exploited a loophole in Defense Department security to copy thousands of files onto compact discs over a six-month period. In at least one instance, according to those familiar with the inquiry, the soldier smuggled highly classified data out of his intelligence unit on a disc disguised as a music CD by Lady Gaga. Criminal charges were filed … [Read more...]

Friend, choreographer, vegan, Gabriel Kahane collaborator, and Most Importantly, Life's a Pitch interview subject and reader, Chase Brock is the model for a new Wii game, "Dance on Broadway"! This excellent news comes via Broadway World dot com:"Whoa, Nellie!" and "Mirror Mirror," highlight the Chase Brock Experience season at the Connelly Theater, July 8 - 11. "Whoa, Nellie!," set to Nellie McKay's album "Obligatory  Villagers," and "Mirror Mirror," set to a commissioned piano score by award-winning Broadway and opera composer Michael … [Read more...]

Two Saturday afternoons ago, I was attempting to give myself a home-facial and read my new book. Often-fortunately though not so in this case, "home" now means "the floor above a bar," so the US games of the 2010 World Cup were...an adventure. During the first round, my friends came over for brunch, and were leaving just as the boys in red, white and blue scored their first (last?) goal. The simultaneous shouting was so loud that we slammed the door shut and stood in my, let's say "foyer," panting like cartoon versions of ourselves. The UK and … [Read more...]

A week from today, I'll be participating in a live chat on behalf of my client, Chamber Music America, focusing on an article about artists using social media that appears in the July/August issue of Chamber Music magazine. Since the thesis of the piece is that we need to continue the conversation off the stage and the page (zing!), Chamber Music America wants to do just that with this chat (see, I rhyme on Wednesdays). Click here to download a PDF if you don't receive the publication. I sound terribly un-smart, but I'll/you'll/we'll survive. … [Read more...]

And then this happened:Or at least is going to happen. Via my summer intern via The Guardian, I bring you the "OMG" moment of the week: The "Queen of Soul" is to team up with the former queen of the US state department at a concert in Philadelphia next month. Aretha Franklin will duet with former US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice, performing songs such as Natural Woman and Say a Little Prayer.The concert, a fundraising event for inner city children, takes place on 27 July, at the Mann Centre for the Performing Arts. Franklin and Rice will … [Read more...]

Warning: this blog post may be even more lowbrow than that one with the mice playing instruments. Consider yourselves emotionally prepared. I was just watching some pre-fireworks True Blood, and noticed that Pam Ravenscroft, hench-woman vampire with a propensity toward pink, bears an uncanny resemblance to Life's a Pitch's second favorite soprano, Renée Fleming. Look, they even have THE SAME FINGERLESS GLOVES! I'm fairly to moderately pleased with myself for making this connection. I never could have done it without Renée's recent Dark Hope … [Read more...]

...but yes, I am going to talk about Twilight: Eclipse the day after it was released. Twilight: Eclipse, Twilight: Eclipse. "Twilight: Eclipse." And while we're on the topic of search engine optimization, I learned this week via Sitemeter that you get to this blog when you Google "hot sex." Right, so, anyone who's here looking for hot sex, welcome, enjoy your stay, and I'm sorry - I'm going to talk about classical music PR now. Last Friday, a friend slash colleague and I were at Nick and Toni's discussing marketing geeky things to geeky folks … [Read more...]

Hearty marketing and public relations congratulations are in order for the Metropolitan Museum of Art, who report that 5,240,000 people visited the museum and nearly 40 million visited their website this year. From the press release:Attendance at The Metropolitan Museum of Art reached 5,240,000 visitors during the fiscal year that ends today, June 30, the Museum has announced.  This is the first year since 2001 that attendance at the Metropolitan has exceeded five million. The number, which includes attendance at The Cloisters museum and … [Read more...]

I just love press that includes marketing shout-outs. From the New York Times' Steve Smith's review of Sunday's Bang on a Can Marathon: Using an Internet metaphor seems especially appropriate, given an increased emphasis on social media this year. Elsewhere, using Twitter during a performance might be viewed as bad manners; here, crew members and volunteers wore T-shirts emblazoned with Twitter-friendly slogans: "follow @bangonacan" and "tweet #boac." Stage announcements called attention to a social-media lounge upstairs, where Twitter users … [Read more...]

I was on the Amtrak with my friend Scott heading up to a wedding in Mystic, CT a few weekends back, and he figured that was as good a time as any to tell me about another wedding he had gone to recently. Fortunately, he didn't have to describe this wedding in any sort of great detail, because we had a New York Times piece to do that for us:WHEN Amanda Blackwell of Columbus, Ga., first met Maj. Andrew Gallo in 2004, he mentioned having gone to West Point. She knew so little about the Army then that she thought he meant a small Georgia town … [Read more...]

I had a meeting with my client composer Michael Gordon on Monday, and out of nowhere he said something like, "Yeah, and with the Rock Band thing..."What "Rock Band thing"??Turns out, the following pieces are now available to play on Rock Band!David Lang - Cheating, Lying, Stealing Michael Gordon - Yo Shakespeare Evan Ziporyn - Shadowbang (Head)Julia Wolfe's Believing will also be available soon. According to the folks at Bang on a Can's label, Cantaloupe, Alex Rigopulos, founder of Harmonix and Rock Band creator, went to MIT with Bang on a Can … [Read more...]

From The Awl: This photo, sent in by this morning one of our local operatives, shows the full glory of the enormous Toy Story 3 advertisement that adorns the gorgeous Miami Herald building. Well, it's a business model.Fan-tastic. … [Read more...]

I got a bagel with cream cheese for breakfast yesterday (don't judge me, it was multi-grain), and as I was walking back to my apartment, I was fondly recalling the days at my last job when there would be bagels in the conference room for some kind of occasion. Sure, I could have bought the same bagel with cream cheese for a dollar sixty three (not that I know exactly how much bagels cost because I get them so often or anything), but it just tastes better when it's free and a surprise. I feel similarly about free-and-a-surprise press hits. Of … [Read more...]