AJBlogs

Why Did the Boston Symphony Decide Not To Hire Leonard Bernstein? Did that Decision Change the Course of American Music?

Today’s Boston’s “The Arts Fuse” carries an investigative piece of mine exploring how the Boston Symphony trustees decided not to hire Leonard Bernstein as the orchestra’s Music Director in 1949 even though he was the chosen successor of Serge Koussevitzky. This story is not irrelevant to the current controversy over

AJ Chronicles: The Excellence Problem and Why it Matters

I don't mean to be pedantic, but I think defining what we mean by excellence really matter if we're really going to figure out the place of AI in creativity. Four stories this week suggest layers to this debate:

Maribeth Stahl shares why Data, Depth and Discovery are critical to fundraising

Maribeth Stahl, Chief Development Officer of The Cleveland Orchestra, shares why Data, Depth and Discovery are key ingredients for successful fundraising.

Doing the Right Thing With Nonprofit Arts Organizations: “Like Walking in High Heels Through Meat”

...while the attention to charity has evolved, the nonprofit arts behemoth class has not.

AI tricks

[A human named David Szalay]. Paul Bloom posted this note on Substack: I’ve always thought that I would never want to read an AI-written novel, no matter how objectively well-written it is. But I’m starting to question this. I’m on a real David Szalay kick these days; last night, I finished “London

AJ Chronicles: Why Tech Infrastructure is the Most Important Arts Story of the Year

The infrastructure carrying culture to audiences — legal, technical, financial, corporate — was not built for the creative sector. It was built by and for technology companies, telecommunications firms, and entertainment conglomerates.

Sidney Jackson talks about the unique role of the Chicago Sinfonietta

Sidney Jackson, President & CEO of Chicago Sinfonietta, talks about their unique role and impact regionally and nationally.

“Dog on a Cold Stone Floor,” or When Nonprofit Arts Organizations Obsess About the Art More Than the People

Art is a universal good. No argument. Nonprofit arts organizations are not art, and therefore are not a universal good. No argument there, either.

Liberal Arts

(Kudos to the art director who chose that American flag done with handprints – it’s perfect). I enjoyed reading Becca Rothfield’s “Listless Liberalism” in The Point, in which she reviews Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson’s Abundance, and Cass Sunstein’s Liberalism, and also asks the question of why the aesthetics of a liberal society, barely addressed

Rachel Thompson shares the curricular ties between students and arts institutions

Rachel Thompson, Program Manager at the Curb Center for Art, Enterprise & Public Policy at Vanderbilt, talks about building curricular ties between students and the arts and art institutions.

Born in the DSA*: Bat$#^t Crazy Leadership Does Not Happen By Accident, and It Can Only Be Crushed If We Do It Together

The popular guy in charge of the DSA is a greedy, paranoid sociopath, a malevolent narcissist, and is probably experiencing dementia. It’s a tactic that works for him, even as it destroys the DSA.

Should there be a tax deduction for donating to the nonprofit arts?

I was at a seminar yesterday given by Professor Philip Hackney of the University of Pittsburgh School of Law, given (via web) at the Marxe School at Baruch College, on “Tax Policy Toward Arts Nonprofits: Democracy or Plutocracy?” It’s a good question! I won’t try to summarize what Professor Hackney

Colleges, students, and jobs: nobody knows anything

In my past life I spent some time in university administration, and one of my jobs at this public university was to take proposals for new degree programs that the university had approved of to the state board of higher education, for their necessary approval. In those proposals we had to include

Reading Eleonora Redaelli’s Invisible Cultural Policy in America

This recent book is open access, here. And my full review in the International Review of Public Policy is also open access, here. My review begins: There is an old joke: An American tourist is visiting Oxford for the first time, and on his first morning signs up for a guided walking tour. The

I didn’t want to be right: Kennedy Center closing for two years

Is the Kennedy Center really closing because of renovations? Or is it to save face from audience and artist protests?

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