Monday, March 20
A Public Broadcasting Endowment? The US is planning a major auction of broadcast bandwidth, which could mean a bonanza for public broadcasting. "The auction, now scheduled for 2009, is being made possible by the switch from analog to digital broadcasting technology. Digital broadcasting requires less bandwidth than analog, meaning parts of the spectrum can be freed up for sale to cell phone companies, wireless Internet firms and others.the auction could generate anywhere from $500 million to $5 billion that could be used to set up a permanent trust fund for public broadcasting." Pittsburgh Post-Gazette 03/20/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 9:12 am
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Vettriano: Who Cares About Critics? Jack Vettriano's paintings are wildly popular with the public, and his work fetches huge prices. But he takes a workman's attitude to art: "It's wall decoration for me, I don't regard it as this big meaningful thing. My subjects are men and women getting off, that's all. Mind you, some people don't think sex is serious, but I happen to think it's terribly serious." Scotland on Sunday 03/19/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 8:30 am
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New Life For Old Sounds "Curators at the University of California at Santa Barbara's Donald C. Davidson Library have digitized 6,000 late 19th-century and early 20th-century wax and plastic cylinder recordings -- precursors to the flat record. The audio, which includes ragtime hits, vaudeville routines and presidential speeches, encapsulates history with crackles and hisses, but archivists say preserving the sounds now is vital because the cylinders are deteriorating." Wired 03/20/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 8:56 am
New Opera - A Future On Which To Build? "Conventional wisdom holds that no one writes good operas anymore — not, at least, operas that anyone wants to hear. Yet in the United States, this view is yielding to the idea among presenters that new American opera — pieces by American composers based on American stories — may be the future of a field fighting the perception that it is static, Eurocentric and outdated." The New York Times 03/19/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 12:44 am
SXSW - Marketplace To Bypass The Majors "As the major-label recording business struggles with ungovernable competition online, many musicians have decided that the way to make a career is in the mode of troubadours from time immemorial: performing live and hitting the road. But where troubadours depended on word of mouth, now musicians can spread their own reputations online; at SXSW, as the event is known, many seek the next link." The New York Times 03/20/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 12:29 am
Castrati - Freakish Phenoms? "The castrati - or evirati, as they were politely called - are perhaps the most freakish phenomenon in Western musical history. Eunuchs had been a common feature of the courts of the Islamic world long before they appeared in 17th-century Italy, which seems to be the only Western country where castration was widely performed - the operation was illegal, but parents of the victims just mumbled about unfortunate encounters with wild boars, and prosecutions were rare." The Telegraph (UK) 03/19/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 12:16 am
Convention: A Narrowing Of Orchestral Repertoire "A certain culture has grown around the presentation of orchestral music. Because something in the programme requires the full might of a symphony orchestra, it has tended to dictate the scale of everything else on the programme. Because of the inherent and intrinsic tendency of symphony orchestras to programme concerts featuring pretty exclusively their total playing resources, the repertoire (and audiences) have, over a very long stretch of time, been thus starved of seriously interesting music that requires fewer musicians to perform, and has therefore become sidelined and neglected." Glasgow Herald 03/19/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 12:08 am
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Art Of Conversation "Conversation is one of those acts that require subtle forms of social imagination: an ability to listen and interpret and imagine, an attentiveness to someone whose perspective is always essentially different, a responsiveness that both makes oneself known and allows the other to feel known — or else does none of this, but just keeps up appearances. It may be, then, one of the most fundamental political and social acts, indispensable to negotiating allegiances, establishing common ground, clearing tangled paths. Conversation may reflect not just the state of our selves, but the state of society." The New York Times 03/20/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 12:27 am
Who Owns The Public? "The practice of street photography has a long tradition in the United States, with documentary and artistic strains, in big cities and small towns. Photographers usually must obtain permission to photograph on private property — including restaurants and hotel lobbies — but the freedom to photograph in public has long been taken for granted. Remarkably, this was the first case to directly challenge that right. Had it succeeded, "Subway Passenger, New York City," 1941, along with a vast number of other famous images taken on the sly, might no longer be able to be published or sold." The New York Times 03/19/06
Posted: 03/19/2006 9:14 am
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Violinist Sues Seattle Symphony The complaint alleges "intentional emotional distress arising out of the hostile environment and harassment ... over a long and extended period of time." The violinist, who has an anxiety disorder that developed in his late teens, said in his suit that he has suffered "persistent and severe discrimination." Seattle Post-Intelligencer 03/16/06
Posted: 03/19/2006 9:22 am
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Latino Theatre Company Wins Management Of Theatre Center The Latino Theatre Company has been granted money to manage the Los Angeles Theatre Center in downton LA. "The awarding of the management agreement brings to a close a drawn-out — and often contentious — battle over who should run the historic venue, which served as a home to the Latino Theater, Will & Company, Moving Arts and Playwrights' Arena theater companies." Los Angeles Tribune 03/20/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 9:07 am
Can Kevin Spacey Turn Around The Old Vic? Kevin Spacey is dealing with another play at the Old Vic getting a critical drubbing. Spacey's trying to make the theatre work. But it's an uphill battle... The Observer (UK) 03/19/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 8:46 am
Plays Fresh As The News Plays ripped from the headlines can give us a different perspective on those stories. "Ultimately, theater is mostly about being pulled into stories — familiar ones, new ones. And as polarizing or perplexing as our present-day stories can be, they come to us from a different angle in the theater than from our TV sets or computer screens."
Posted: 03/20/2006 8:13 am
"Rings" - Aiming For Three-Plus Hours Lord of the Rings, the musical, is long. Very long. "As the March 23 opening night bears down on the cast and crew of the most expensive theatrical show of all time, several issues still need attention. Some scenes and characters don't work quite right. The music must be tweaked. Actors are still working on their characters. And the show's producers must fix these things while making it all go faster — far faster than the nearly five hours the show ran at its first night of previews Feb. 4." Toronto Star 03/19/06
Posted: 03/19/2006 11:02 pm
This Is What a $23 Million Musical Looks Like (Almost) The new Lord of the Rings musical costs $23 million. "This is one of the most expensive theatrical productions ever, and it comes on the heels of an Oscar-winning film trilogy of the Tolkien classics, of which more than 100 million books have been sold worldwide. On top of paring 1,200 pages to 3 1/2 hours of text and music to tell the by now familiar tale of hobbits, elves and humans pitted against evil wizards and their henchmen, the creators faced the challenge of assembling a team of 75 technicians from around the world, a cast of 55 — classical actors, singers, dancers and acrobats — and a 25-piece orchestra." Los Angeles Times 03/19/06
Posted: 03/19/2006 10:49 pm
Tonys Ban Voter Swag Oscar "goodie bags" were worth more than $100,000 to presenters. There will be no such largesse to voters for the Tonys. "The Tony Awards Rules Committee has adopted resolutions that ban the distribution of "any campaign or promotional materials to voters, other than a script or a cast recording" tied to a show in award contention. The resolutions also prohibit nominees' promotion through any communication that disparages or casts "any negative or derogatory light on a competing production, element, person or achievement." Los Angeles Times 03/19/06
Posted: 03/19/2006 10:38 pm
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Da Vinci Plagiarism Case In Final Arguments Summing up the plaintiffs' case of plagiarism against Da Vinci Code author Dan Brown, Jonathan Rayner James QC sounds more like a man complaining about a verdict he knows is coming than someone marshalling evidence. He said Brown had been "unco-operative" in court. "He had almost no recollection of matters that related to issues of timing." BBC 03/19/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 8:34 am
Subway Series - London And Shanghai Shanghai and London are exchanging subway poetry. "Under the deal, which took years to thrash out, the London Underground - which has displayed poems for 20 years - is displaying lines from some of China's great wordsmiths: Li Bai, Du Pu and Po Chu-i. Next month the mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, will launch a similar programme in Shanghai with Wordsworth's Daffodils, Blake's Auguries of Innocence, Jamie's The Blue Boat and Bullock's Butterfly." The Guardian (UK) 03/18/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 12:01 am
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Measuring The Video Audience In The Tivo Age Nielsen is figuring out ways to measure ratings for shows on Tivo, on cell phones, on computers. But if one of the big draws to Tivo is being able to skip commercials, what do ratings matter to advertisers? Wired 03/20/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 8:59 am
Movie Theatres Stuck In Digital Divide The movie theatre industry has been promising a switch to digital for years, but it still hasn't happened. "Digital cinema promises to slash distribution costs associated with shipping heavy tins of 35-mm prints to thousands of theaters worldwide. That will give cinema owners new choices and flexibility in booking movies and other kinds of entertainment content, like live concerts or sporting events. But cinema owners still worry that the digital equipment might require constant upgrades, be more complicated to operate, or break down more often than what they've got in their projection booths today." Wired 03/20/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 8:54 am
Pirates Change Ending Of Oscar-Winning Movie The South African movie Tsotsi recently won an Oscar. But back home, a pirated version of the movie features a different ending. "While the theatrical version ends ambiguously, with the fate of the young tsotsi left unknown, the pirated version ends in violence." The director "believes that the pirated DVD was created from an early, rough version of Tsotsi stolen while the film was being edited. The version lacks sound and technical refinements found in the completed feature." CBC 03/20/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 8:49 am
Bollywood Director Recruits Criminals For Movie The director says "he has tried to portray the reality of crime and therefore chose actors who were familiar with it. 'If real criminals or people who have had personal experiences with crime and law come forward and act in such a movie, then it is not acting for them, it becomes real. All the characters become themselves in the movie and dialogues will not seem like dialogues but actual conversation'." BBC 03/20/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 8:45 am
The Rise Of Clip Culture "Major broadcasters are emphasising the need to deliver their content across multiple platforms including conventional television, downloads and streaming services, as well as wireless devices. Based on pilot projects and other small-scale initiatives, it is fair to say that this future is already here." BBC 03/20/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 8:41 am
Do You YouTube? "Thousands of amateur video clips, rare footage of music concerts and home-made film spoofs are now being uploaded every day to the video-sharing website YouTube for the enjoyment of millions of web users around the world. Allowing the public to watch and share clips for free, it has become an unprecedented platform for amateur film-makers to show off their home movies. But music labels, film studios and television bosses are now cracking down on the site." Scotland on Sunday 03/19/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 8:28 am
The New NPR - Money And Ambition What has national Public Radio done with its gift of $230 million from Joan Kroc's estate? For one thing, "NPR has created nearly 70 new jobs in its newsroom, many of them for reporters on newly created beats like police and prisons, labor, international economics, the environment, technology and the media. And all this as other news organizations have been paring their staffs and scaling back their ambitions as consumers and advertisers drift away." The New York Times 03/19/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 12:39 am
Tivo Glitch Irritates Fans "Because of a software glitch in some machines, TiVo customers have been discovering over the last few months that some of the shows they had set to record were cut off before the programs ended." The New York Times 03/20/06
Posted: 03/20/2006 12:34 am
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Tere O'Connor On Dance: "I feel it's unfortunate that people feel that there's a hidden intellectualism in dance, but it's one of those places where marginalization looks elitist and it's not. Lace-making is not a popular thing, and in a way it's the same thing with dance. We're small, not because we don't want more people, but because this is a different way of looking at the world that isn't born out of capitalism or religion." The New York Times 03/19/06
Posted: 03/19/2006 9:20 am
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