And some of them are earning $100,000 a month. In the Amazon self-publishing universe where authors earn a share of revenue based on how many people are reading, scammers have so gamed the system that quality legitimate books are being edged out, and money is going to clickbait. – The Guardian
After General Manager’s Ouster, WBUR Radio Considers Separating From Boston University
“Discussions began immediately after the group, known as WBUR’s Board of Overseers, learned that General Manager Charlie Kravetz” — credited with building the station into a public radio powerhouse that distributes numerous programs nationally — “would no longer oversee daily operations of the station and would leave, officially, at the end of June. Members of the board, which has no direct decision-making authority, say they felt blindsided by the decision and ignored by BU when they protested.” – WBUR (Boston)
Arts And Culture Add More Than $800 Billion A Year To U.S. Economy: Report
That adds up to more than 4% of the entire nation’s GDP. “That figure is based on detailed data from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (part of the Department of Commerce) and the National Endowment for the Arts, summarized in a report released earlier this month. The report tracks the aggregate performance of 35 key arts-and-culture fields, including broadcasting, movies, streaming, publishing, the performing arts, arts-related retail, and more.” – CityLab
Sing-A-Long Musicals Are Becoming A Thing
Of course, in your traditional theatre experience, you go to listen to the performers. But just as audiences have been joining in for showings of Rocky Picture Horror and Sound of Music, they’re now coming to musicals to join in with the cast singing. So what’s the appeal? – The Guardian
Charges Of Mismanagement Of Control Of Balanchine’s Ballets
Unlike a painting or the written score of a symphony, a dance is uniquely fragile because there is no foolproof way to preserve it and steps are easily forgotten. Even a complete work can be changed in subtle ways so that its vivacity is flattened. The petition raises a thorny question: Who is truly in charge of this peerless treasury of artworks for the next decades? – Washington Post
Books Make Money, And Anyone Who Says They Don’t Is Lying In Order To Stiff Employees
Or at least that’s the claim a book editor is making: “In publishing circles, you often hear the phrase ‘I put up with it because I love my job so much’ – we accept the shortcomings and remind ourselves to be grateful for the privilege of working in an industry so seemingly fragile. However, contrary to popular belief, the industry is not at risk of dying – far from it.” – The Guardian (UK)
Architects Need To Choose The Planet First
This piece is a fine, furious, anguished, specific call for action. “Our civilisation faces its end date. Cities are expanding refugee camps for a species in crisis. Every particle matters.” Yet architecture firms cut and paste specifications, not using green developers or materials when they could. That must change. – Dezeen
The Major Cinema Chains Are Badly Exploiting Their Cleaning Staffs
This is bad: “The major chains — AMC, Regal Entertainment and Cinemark — no longer rely on teenage ushers to keep the floors from getting sticky. Instead, they have turned to a vast immigrant workforce, often hired through layers of subcontractors. That arrangement makes it almost impossible for janitors to make a living wage.” – Variety
Why Are We Still Talking (And Making Documentary Art) About This Man, Jailed For Murdering His Ex-Girlfriend?
Yes, if you’ve listened to all (or even most) of NPR’s wildly popular true-crime podcast Serial, you might not be ready for an HBO special on Adnan Syed. But would you be if the story concerned Hae Min Lee, the murdered girl at the center of the case? For director Amy Berg, that’s the point. – The New York Times
How To Pick The Perfect Seat In The Movie Theatre
You’ll know the worst seat – i.e., the front row. “The existence of a worst, then, must suggest its opposite: The ideal seat. The perfect focal point that maximizes your visual and aural experience. Does it exist?” It’s science, y’all. – Popular Science
Can We At Least Try To Make Ballet As Diverse As Contemporary Art?
Peter Boal of Pacific Northwest Ballet writes about his January trip around the US to audition dancers — and about how what he saw in the museums and galleries he visited made him think about the still-off racial balance of his and other ballet companies. – Dance Magazine
With New Curator, New York’s Museo Del Barrio Tries To Make Peace With Activists Who Say It Has Abandoned Its Nuyorican Roots
The East Harlem museum was founded 50 years ago by local artists and teachers who felt that the existing museums and institutions in New York had shut them out. Since then, the museum has expanded its mission to cover art from Latin American itself, and battles have periodically broken out over that change — including this week. In response, the Museo’s director announced that he’ll be hiring a new curator focused on “the art and culture of historically marginalized Latinx communities in the United States, including but not limited to Puerto Ricans, Chicanos, Afro-descendants from the Americas and LGBTQ populations.” – The New York Times
Paris Sees Blackface Controversy As Students Protest Aeschylus Staging At Sorbonne
Denouncing the staging (which no one had yet seen) as “Afrophobic, colonialist and racist,” protesters forced the Sorbonne to cancel a performance of The Suppliants at the university’s annual festival of ancient Greek theatre. Top Sorbonne officials and government officials called the protests “absurd,” while the director insisted that the production used no blackface at all. – The Guardian
New Canadian Film Shot In Indigenous Language With Only 20 Speakers Left
“With subtitles, audiences will be able to understand a feature film titled SGaawaay K’uuna, translated as Edge of the Knife, which has its UK premiere in April. It is in two dialects of the highly endangered Haida language, the ancestral tongue of the Haida people of British Columbia. … The film is playing an important role in preserving the language, its director Gwaai Edenshaw said.” – The Guardian
Theatre Company Goes Into Welsh Schools To Teach Students About Drug-Dealer Dangers
Long-distance drug-dealing gangs known as “county lines” have hit North Wales hard, with all the attendant violence and human misery. Theatr Clwyd, a professional company in the region, is touring to area schools with a new play depicting the dangers and consequences of getting involved with a county lines gang. – BBC
Literary Prize Runners Denounce ‘False Hierarchy’ Of Prizes, Then Revise Their Own Prize Accordingly
Said the organizers of the Republic of Consciousness Prize, devoted to books from publishers with five or fewer employees, “While the competitive dynamic of prizes points readers towards ‘the best books’, they also create a false hierarchy where ‘the best’ becomes a valid category.” So, beginning with this year, judges may select anywhere from one to four titles as winners, “on the criteria that book X or Y cannot not win.'” – The Guardian
Staging The Stories Of The Women Who Faithfully Visit Their Loved Ones In Prison
Liza Jessie Peterson, playwright and star of The Peculiar Patriot: “I came to Columbus Circle [in Manhattan] at midnight and found a whole fleet of buses. All these women, children and even some men were boarding these buses to go to the upstate correctional facilities. They would ride all night, go through a long, degrading security process, just to spend a few hours with their loved ones, before taking the bus home. As I talked to those women, I knew I was witnessing one of the great love stories of our time. A writer friend said, ‘You know, you have a profound story to tell, so tell it.”” – The Washington Post
Recent Listening: Logan Strosahl, ‘Sure’
Logan Strosahl, Sure (Sunnyside)
Piping at the high end of the flute’s range, guttural near the tenor sax’s low end, sliding, slurring and sometimes punching notes on alto saxophone, Strosahl is intense and full of surprises with his trio. – Doug Ramsey
Modernism, Interracial Relations, Cultural Appropriation, And Katherine Dunham Meet (Or Collide) In A 1933 Ballet In Chicago
Liesl Olson investigates the strange and stirring history of La Guiablesse, an almost entirely lost 18-minute dance work based on French Caribbean folklore, with a white choreographer/star (Ruth Page) playing a she-devil, an otherwise entirely black cast, a colorful score by black composer William Grant Still, and the future star and pioneer Dunham as the spurned lover. (She took over as the eponymous demon the following year.) – Chicago Reader
Theatre in the Age of Climate Change
“How does our work reflect on, and respond to, the challenges brought on by a warming climate? How can we participate in the global conversation about what the future should look like, and do so in a way that is both inspiring and artistically rewarding?” Five theatre artists add their contributions to a long-term conversation at HowlRound that has been going on since 2015. – HowlRound
The Recovery Orchestra – Service Organization For Recovering Addicts Starts Ensemble For Its Clients
“The Recovery Orchestra was set up by Bristol Drugs Project (BDP) to help individuals using their services. It encourages people to take up an instrument or use the skills they already had in a joint musical activity. The group, funded by the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, will perform at a Bristol church this week.” (video) – BBC