Thursday August 30
FRANK
EMILIO FLYNN, 80: Blind pianist Frank Emilio Flynn has died
in his home town of Havana. With the Symphonic Orchestra of Havana,
he performed music of Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven which had been
transcribed into Braille. He was best known, however, as a pioneer
of Latin jazz. Nando Times (AP)
08/29/01
Tuesday August 28
BASICALLY
BARENBOIM: Conductor/pianist Daniel Barenboim has had a controversial
year. Prodigiously busy musically, he's also been embroiled in
spats from Berlin to Israel. Though critics increasingly pick
holes in his musical interpretations, "he remains one of
the most discussed musicians of our age — not least because, among
his Protean gifts, is a talent for stirring up controversy that
borders on genius. That is evident from the battles he has fought
over the past few months." The
Times (UK) 08/28/01
SCHNABEL,
92: Legendary piano teacher Karl Ulrich Schnabel died Monday
in Connecticut at the age of 92. "Schnabel taught master
classes in Europe, Asia and in North and South America. He began
teaching at age 13, preparing students who wanted to study with
his father." Nando Times (AP)
08/28/01
Monday August 27
DECIDING
ARCHER'S ART: Playwright and British MP Lord Archer is in
jail for perjury, and he's facing big claims on his fortune. Does
this mean he'll lose his art collection, reportedly worth tens
of millions of pounds? The Art Newspaper
08/24/01
Friday August 24
BERKOFF
IN THE DOCK: Playwright Steven Berkoff is considered a genius
by some, a true original."This is the dramatist who recently
declared that he should take over the National and fire all its
existing staff. This is the dramatist who has caused stir after
stir in the theatre, back in 1975 shocking Edinburgh by using
the c-word 29 times in the course of a 90-second speech. Now Berkoff
faces a damages claim for £500,000 from a woman, who cannot be
named, alleging that she was raped, assaulted and racially abused
by him." The Times (UK) 08/24/01
- BERKOFF
DEFENDS: Berkoff says the law should be changed so that
men like him couldn't ne charged with rape. "It's the most terrible
thing that's ever happened to me, but it will be resolved. It's
ironic that it should happen now when everyone is finally beginning
to see that I am sensitive." The
Guardian (UK) 08/24/01
Thursday August 23
ARTS
CZAR STEPS DOWN: Evan Williams, Sydney's de facto arts Czar,
is retiring. "Williams was the boss of the bosses of the
Art Gallery of NSW, the Australian Museum, the Museum of Applied
Arts and Sciences (the Powerhouse), the NSW State Library, the
Historic Houses Trust, the Sydney Opera House, the State Records
of NSW, and the NSW Film and Television Office." Sydney
Morning Herald 08/23/01
Wednesday August 22
CLEVELAND
CURATOR LEAVES: Diane De Grazia is leaving the job of chief
curator of the Cleveland Museum of Art. "An expert on 17th-century
European paintings and drawings, De Grazia came to Cleveland from
the National Gallery of Art in Washington. The
Plain Dealer (Cleveland) 08/22/01
WHEN
THEY REALLY REALLY DON'T WANT YOU: Last week the Scottish
Ballet informed Robert North it wouldn't be renewing his contract
as artistic director. Now North has been told by the Scottish
government he has to leave the country within eight days or he'll
be thrown in prison... Glasgow Herald
08/22/01
Tuesday August 21
IT'S
A MONEY THING: Why did David Ross leave as director of San
Francisco's SFMOMA? It was money. Ross saw some opportunities
for himself to make some money. The museum's board thought Ross's
being the head of a website that sells art was a conflict. And,
as the economic downturn was affecting the museum, Ross was thought
not to be the person to get the museum through it. "David is an
entrepreneur - he comes up with 15 ideas an hour - and it's hard
for nonprofits to deal with that. Now he has come to a point where
there is an opportunity to go to a for-profit and benefit financially
from his ideas. We understand. When you tell someone like David
to stop, you destroy him." San Francisco
Chronicle 08/21/01
Monday August 20
THE
GREAT ART SCAMMER: Michel Cohen was such a successful player
in the art markets that he could borrow $100 million to buy paintings,
with few questions asked. But he also couldn't resist trying to
double his money in the stock market, and when the market crashed,
he vanished with a lot of other people's money. National
Post (Telegraph) (Canada) 08/20/01
Friday August 17
NEW
RODGERS BIO SAYS: Outwardly, Broadway composer Richard Rodgers,
who died in 1979 at 77, seemed to have led a charmed life. But
he was an alcoholic, and "the drinking increased throughout
his life - playwright Moss Hart once saw him down 16 scotch and
sodas in one sitting - and in 1957, he was hospitalized for depression
and alcoholism at Payne Whitney, which the novelist Jean Stafford
called a 'high-class booby hatch'." New
York Post 08/17/01
Wednesday August 15
ACCIDENTAL
CAREER: Christopher Wheeldon is the hottest young choreographer
around right now. Not long ago the 28-year-old British-born dancer
was a star with New York City Ballet. How he got there, though,
started with an ankle injury. The
Guardian (UK) 08/15/01
Tuesday August 14
TALL
AND TAN AND SUED: The Girl from Ipanema (she of the song's
inspiration) is now 57, and she owns a boutique called Girl
from Ipanema in Sao Paulo, where she now lives. The families
of the men who wrote the song - claiming copyright - are suing
to stop her from using the name on the store. National
Post (Canada) 08/14/01
Monday August 13
REMEMBERING
JOHN GIELGUD: "Now that Gielgud, who seemed immortal,
nevertheless died in 2000 at the age of 96, a century of Anglophone
theater seems to have gone with him. Partly because theater has
changed, the dashing romantic leading man à la Olivier and the
sensitive, musical-voiced protagonist à la Gielgud are seldom
called for nowadays, even in Shakespeare." The
New York Times 08/12/01 (one-time
resistration required for access)
WHAT
WRECKED BRANDO: Marlon Brando was poised to be one of the
great actors of the 20th Century. But his contempt for his profession
and the way Hollywood was set up to accomodate him made for the
unraveling of his career. The New
Republic 08/13/01
Sunday August 12
MENOTTI
AT 90: Gian-Carlo Menotti is turning 90. "So much fuss. All
of a sudden I'm famous not because I write good music but because
I'm old and still here. My advice to composers is, try to reach
90, and everyone will love you." But though he is beloved in Italy
and still has some champions, elsewhere his music has been passed
by. The New York Times 08/12/01
(one-time registration required for access)
Friday August 10
LIFE
AFTER VIRGINIA: What was Leonard Woolf's influence and contribution
to Virginia Woolf's work? A set of letters, written by Leonard
after his wife's suicide to a woman he had a prolonged afair with,
shed some light on Virginia's creative life. Irish
Times 08/10/01
Thursday August 9
ONLY
TWO MORE YEARS OF MISHA? Mikhail Baryshnikov is 53 and still
dancing. "He has had six operations to one of his knees.
Some mornings he is so stiff that he has to crawl to the bathroom
and get under a hot shower before he can move easily. He is convinced
he will die at 60. He says, 'All my relatives died very young.
I really believe in genetics. I hope I am wrong. I will go when
I am 55, when I am 60. I am prepared: at least I can speak about
it. . '." The Telegraph (UK)
08/09/01
Wednesday August 8
POETRY
CON: Ravi Desai pledged millions of dollars for poetry programs
at major American universities. But after fanfare over the gifts
died down, Desai failed to come through with the money. "Most
business cons are for riches. This was a con whose payoff was
to rub shoulders with poets. What did he gain, except for an engraved
ax?" Poets & Writers 08/01/01
JORGE
AMADO, 88: Jorge Amado was Brazil's most popular
and most successful novelist; his 32 books have sold millions
of copies in more than 40 languages. Perhaps his best known -
at home and abroad - was Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands,
which sold two million copies in Brazil alone. Amado had been
in ill health for several years. The
New York Times 08/07/01 (one-time registration
required for access)
Tuesday August 7
BIG
BUCKS, BIG THANKS (EXPECTED): Alberto Vilar has given more
than $200 million to the cause of opera. "The magnitude of
his giving would guarantee his fame; the conditions often attached
to those gifts, however, have given him a quirky notoriety. Vilar
persuaded the Met to give the names of major underwriters greater
prominence in its programs; this took some effort."
Opera News 08/01
TAKING
IT PERSONALLY: Wall Street Journal Pulitzer Prize-winning
opera critic Manuela Hoelterhoff is every bit as outspoken in
her personal life as she is in her reviews. Now she's in
court defending herself from a lawsuit brought by one of her most
powerful New York suburban neighbors. Seems she made a cutting
remark about part of his anatomy and he took it personally...
New York Magazine 08/07/01
HARMONICA
MASTER DIES: "Highly-acclaimed musician Larry Adler,
widely acknowledged as the world's greatest harmonica player,
has died at the age of 87." BBC
08/07/01
COULD
SOMEONE FETCH MR. CLINTON $10 MIL? "Former President
Clinton has agreed to write his memoirs for Alfred A. Knopf, the
publisher announced Monday, in a deal expected to involve one
of the biggest advances ever for a nonfiction book. The book is
expected to be out in 2003." Ottawa
Citizen (AP) 08/06/01
Monday August 6
WHOLE
LOTTA CONTEMPT GOIN ON: Writer Arunhati Roy has been protesting
a court decision in India not to stop work on construction of
a dam. The court charged her with contempt of court for her characterization
of the decision. And now the court is deciding whether her response
to the contempt charges is further contempt. The
Times of India 08/04/01
READING
IS BELIEVING: Victor Hugo is widely considered to be the greatest
French poet of the 19th century by scholars and lay readers alike.
But aside from repeated viewings of the musical version of Les
Miserables, most English speakers have never had much of a
chance to judge Hugo's work for themselves, most of his work having
never been well-translated. A new collection aims to change all
that. The Weekly Standard 08/06/01
LETTERS
SPECULATE ON PLATH'S DEATH: "A set of unpublished letters
written by the late former poet laureate Ted Hughes - including
one blaming anti-depressants for Sylvia Plath's suicide - have
been acquired by the British Library. The collection of over 140
letters and other documents were written to literary critic, biographer
and friend of Hughes, Keith Sagar, over a period of nearly 30
years." BBC 08/06/01
Sunday August 5
ADAMS
EXHIBIT OPENS IN SF: "The first comprehensive exhibition
of Ansel Adams' work since his death in 1984 reinforces his status
as America's foremost nature photographer and secures a place
for his work on museum walls." Detroit
News (AP) 08/05/01
- WHAT
IF ADAMS HAD GONE DIGITAL? With the advent of digital technology,
the art of photography is likely to change forever. Many famous
photographers of the pre-digital era would likely have had little
use for the new technology, but Ansel Adams, who was so eager
to control every aspect of his work, would likely have embraced
the form. San Francisco Chronicle
08/05/01
CAPTURING
A SOLDIER'S GROWTH: Photographer Rineke Dijkstra has always
been fascinated by the changes people go through as their lives
progress, and her photos reflect the uncertainties of such change:
"frankly expressive, roughly life-size, head-on views of
people at points of change in their lives or moments when they
are vulnerable or not quite composed before the camera."
Her newest project finds her following a new recruit to the French
Foreign Legion. Arizona Republic (NYT
News Service) 08/05/01
Thursday August 2
EINAR
SCHLEEF, 57: German actor, author, and director Einar Schleef
has died in Berlin. "Schleef worked in the mid-1970s at East
Berlin's Berliner Ensemble, founded by Bertolt Brecht. In 1976,
in the face of resistance to his work from the communist authorities,
he left for the west. After Germany was reunited, he returned
to the Berliner Ensemble." Nando Times (AP) 08/01/01
Wednesday August 1
JAZZ
KING: Jazz at Lincoln Center has named Bruce MacCombie, dean
of the School for the Arts at Boston University, as its new executive
director. He's a composer and former dean of Juilliard, and he
replaces Rob Gibson, who was removed from the job in February
in part because of his "divisive" management style.
The New York Times 08/01/01
(one-time registration required for access)
ART
DONATIONS: Washington Post publisher Katharine Graham, who
died last week, left much of her art collection to Washington's
Freer Gallery and the National Gallery of Art. The National gets
"a cubist still life by Diego Rivera; it will be the second
Rivera painting in the gallery's collection." Washington
Post 07/28/01
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