Boston MFA Begins $500 Million Expansion Project
Boston's Museum of Fine Arts breaks ground on a $500 million expansion. "The building project, designed by British architecture firm Foster and Partners of London, will expand the size of the museum by 149,000 square feet, or roughly two-and-a-half football fields. New galleries, a central covered glass-and-steel courtyard with a cafe and a new wing dedicated to art of the Americas highlight the expansion project."
Boston Globe
11/14/05
Posted: 11/14/2005 10:20 pm
Iran Accuses Farmers Of Cultural plunder
"Iranian cultural heritage officials are on a collision course with rural communities after embarking on a legal crusade to reclaim the hills and nearby land on which, they believe, once stood the city of Jondishapour, where the Persian King Shapour I vanquished the Roman emperor Valerian more than 1,700 years ago. They have issued cultivation bans and pressed criminal charges against dozens of farmers accused of destroying parts of the archaeologically sensitive 300-hectare (741-acre) site."
The Guardian (UK)
11/14/05
Posted: 11/14/2005 5:28 pm
Tate Admits Error In Ofili Purchase
The Tate now says it made a "technical error" in seeking money from the National Art Collection Fund to buy a work by Chris Ofili, one of the Tate's trustees. "The Tate did not tell the fund it had already committed itself to purchasing The Upper Room when it made its application in November 2004. Last month Tate director Sir Nicholas Serota wrote a letter to the body offering to repay its £75,000 grant."
BBC
11/14/05
Posted: 11/14/2005 4:14 pm
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In San Francisco: Symphony And Opera Initiatives
"Both the San Francisco Symphony and the San Francisco Opera inaugurated projects over the weekend designed to cajole patrons or patrons-to-be into the groups' respective halls, and to better appreciate what they saw and heard once they got there. The target audiences could not have been more different, but the underlying impulse was not dissimilar."
San Francisco Chronicle
11/15/05
Posted: 11/15/2005 8:13 am
Vienna Phil's First Time With A Woman
Australian conductor Simone Young became the first woman ever to conduct the Vienna Philharmonic last weekend. "Although the mixed-metaphor reviewers were underwhelmed, we have it on good authority that they were generally courteous and even deferential -- a signal perhaps that while Vienna's musical life is stuck in the 19th century, it has some grace, intelligence and dignity."
Straight Up (AJBlogs)
11/15/05
Posted: 11/15/2005 7:15 am
Recording Industry Launches New Wave Of Lawsuits
The recording industry has launched another round of lawsuits against digital downloaders. "The International Federation for the Phonographic Industry said it was launching 2,100 legal cases and extending the action to five new countries in Europe, Asia and, for the first time, South America. It said file-sharers in Sweden, Switzerland, Argentina, Hong Kong and Singapore faced prosecution for the first time."
Yahoo! (Reuters)
11/15/05
Posted: 11/15/2005 6:04 am
Why Are People Replacing CDs, Records With Digital?
Because they lose discs. "The survey found 25% of people prefer to listen to music via their PC or MP3 player rather than a hi-fi. And 35% of those questioned by ICM opted for storing their entire music collection in MP3 format rather than CD or cassette. The figures show the average person owns 126 albums but 37 have had to be replaced for various reasons."
BBC
11/15/05
Posted: 11/15/2005 5:36 am
Note-By-Note Scelsi
"Giacinto Scelsi would have been a hundred this year. Given his mystica propensities, it might be better to say that he is a hundred, although he was observed to have died in 1988. Live performances of this composer?s works remain rare; Michael Tilson Thomas, in San Francisco, is the only American conductor who programs them. It is far easier to get to know the music on recordings, by way of the Accord, CPO, Kairos, and Mode labels. Scelsi?s methods were strange, but he had a command of narrative which no ghostwriter could have provided."
The New Yorker
11/14/05
Posted: 11/14/2005 10:11 pm
Filming At The Met
"For the first time in nearly two decades, since the 1987 'Moonstruck' and its rhapsodic scene from 'La Bohème,' a movie is being filmed at the Metropolitan Opera. The rarity is a result of the Met's busy schedule as well as of the general absence of opera from movies and most of popular culture. But the filming is emblematic of the Met's future reign, in the person of Peter Gelb, who made his mark in the classical recording industry partly with crossover projects and movie soundtracks."
The New York Times
11/15/05
Posted: 11/14/2005 9:44 pm
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Demystifying The Grand Tour
"Brian Sewell's new series for TV Five, is a travelogue in which he examines 'the dark underbelly' of the supposedly educational journeys that were undertaken in the 18th century by young Englishmen from wealthy families. Sewell emits a winsome sigh. 'The Grand Tour is mostly portrayed as young aristocrats who went off and came back with fine paintings. I wanted to indicate that they caught chicken pox, mumps and venereal disease. No one could distinguish between syphilis and gonorrhoea. There was no treatment'."
The Guardian (UK)
11/14/05
Posted: 11/14/2005 9:29 pm
That Song/Album/Movie You Just Bought? (What Do You Own?)
"Not many music lovers have warmed to the idea that they don't retain all the rights to the music they buy. The crux of the debate is this: When you buy a song, an album, or a movie, are you buying the content only in the form it comes in? If you purchase a song from Apple's iTunes store, should you be able to play it on any hardware you want? Not according to Apple, which bundles each download with a "digital rights management" scheme called FairPlay."
Slate
11/14/05
Posted: 11/14/2005 5:01 pm
Boycott Sony
Corporate bad behavior over copyright protection has escalated, reaching something of a nadir when Sony rendered home computers vulnerable to hackers with its new-generation anti-piracy measures. "This kind of behavior can never be tolerated. It may be unrealistic to think many will heed this call, but someone?s got to say it: Boycott Sony. Boycott them until they come clean and recall all the infected CDs. Boycott them until they distribute a removal program. Boycott them until they promise never do anything like this again."
Wired
11/14/05
Posted: 11/14/2005 4:39 pm
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Menuhin's Son Ousted From Violinist's Foundation
"The son of Yehudi Menuhin was ousted as head of the German branch of the music foundation set up by the violinist and humanist after comments he made to a newspaper run by Germany's leading far-right party, the foundation said."
Los Angeles Times (AP)
11/15/05
Posted: 11/15/2005 7:56 am
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Mary Poppins Coming To Broadway
"The show, which will continue its record-breaking run at the Prince Edward Theatre in the West End, is based on the PL Travers series of books, and the 1964 film. In London, it was recently nominated for three Evening Standard Awards, for best musical, best director and best design. The musical will begin performances at Broadway?s New Amsterdam Theatre on October 14, 2006, with an opening date of November 16."
The Stage
11/14/05
Posted: 11/14/2005 10:38 pm
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Handicapping This Year's national Book Awards
A look at the field and likely outcome.
New York Magazine
11/14/05
Posted: 11/14/2005 10:31 pm
Securing The Walrus
"The Walrus Foundation has finally obtained charitable status from the federal government, assuring the future of The Walrus magazine. The award-winning magazine, when launched in Sept. 2003, had proclaimed itself Canada's Harper's, Atlantic and Mother Jones ? essential U.S. periodicals that are also supported by non-profit foundations. The Walrus was underpinned by $1 million annually for five years, to come from the Montreal-based Chawkers charitable foundation. But the money could not flow to the Walrus Foundation until its charitable status, too, was confirmed by Revenue Canada."
Toronto Star
11/13/05
Posted: 11/14/2005 8:21 am
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Tivo Is Losing Ground To Generic DVRs
"The research firm that conducted the study said that TiVo's standalone set-top box is failing in two areas: its inability to record two shows simultaneously and to play back shows in high-definition TV quality. This may not sound like a big deal, but after watching 'Lost' or 'The Sopranos' on HD, there is no going back." Yahoo! (Reuters)
11/15/05
Posted: 11/15/2005 6:13 am
Hollywood Unions Want Product-Placement Rules
Movie and TV writers say they're "being told to write the lines that sell this merchandise and to deftly disguise the sale as a story." "Recent examples include the regular glowing endorsement of Cisco computer security by the characters in [the] US action TV series 24. The heroes also used a fleet of Ford cars as they battled with terrorists. Filmgoers are regularly exposed to products being worked into movies." BBC
11/15/05
Posted: 11/15/2005 5:39 am
Hollywood's Big Box-Office Year (Despite What You've Read)
We've been reading that movie box office has been down this year. That's not quite true. "From January 2005 to September 2005, the movies of the six Hollywood studios earned $4.7 billion compared to $4.5 billion in the same period in 2004. Their share of the American box office rose from 68 percent in 2004 to 75 percent in 2005. The big losers were independent studios who specialize in more adult movies, such as Lions Gate and Newmarket Films, and the so-called "studioless" studios, DreamWorks and MGM, which suffered 40 percent box-office declines." Slate
11/14/05
Posted: 11/14/2005 4:57 pm
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Baryshnikov's New Center Of Gravity
The new Baryshnikov Arts Center opens. "More than anything, Mikhail Baryshnikov intends the center as a meeting place. 'I wanted to bring people together in an informal way. So many collaborations in the theatre, it?s just some producer thinks, Well, this guy had a nomination for Emmy, so, O.K., let?s have him. But it doesn?t have to be well-known choreographer. Could be fair chance given to a young person. I think better collaborative juices grow when people meet on free turf. You?re a poet; I?m a filmmaker. You?re a choreographer; I?m a playwright. People see each other?s work and exchange telephone numbers, and that?s how it starts'.?
The New Yorker
11/14/05
Posted: 11/14/2005 9:55 pm
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