That's exactly what the five-member Improvised Shakespeare Company does: take a suggestion from an audience member and invent an entire play, complete with tragedy, comedy, thwarted love, a prologue, and rhymed couplets. Here's a look at how they do it and the way they train. - The Washington Post
The problem is, Square One is not coming to Broadway (for now, anyway) and the announcement was a hoax. A representative who worked with Sondheim at the time of his passing confirmed to BroadwayWorld that there are no plans for a production of the show at this time. - Broadway World
Gail Samuel, who came to the BSO from the Los Angeles Philharmonic in June 2021, will formally leave the orchestra on Jan. 3 — an abrupt end to a brief tenure. No reason was given for Samuel’s departure. - Boston Globe
Cincinnati Museum of Art chief conservator Serena Urry was inspecting the artist's Still Life with Bread and Eggs this past spring when she saw a couple of white patches between tiny paint cracks, developed a hunch, and had the piece X-rayed. She discovered a rare self-portrait from Cézanne's mid-20s. - CNN
"Bringing to mind the oft-debated adage 'bigger is better,' the Miami institution, which will occupy a repurposed warehouse in the city's Allapattah district, will comprise 32,000 square feet; by comparison, the New York (mothership) boasts just 20,000 square feet," soon to be expanded to 25,000. - Artforum
The list is broken out into the top 20 large communities and the top 10 each of medium-sized and small communities. Because of the unpredictable and uneven nature of recovery from COVID-related shutdowns, this year the list is not ranked. - SMU Data Arts
"(The decision comes) amid $10 million in budget cuts, close to 3% of NPR's annual budget, linked to an anticipated $20 million decline in corporate sponsorship revenue. The latest financial challenge for NPR follows last month's announced hiring freeze, along with cuts to discretionary spending." - Inside Radio
A committee of Cardiff's city council has approved in principle an operating lease of St. David's Hall — which hosts the BBC National Symphony of Wales and the Cardiff Singer of the World competition — to Academy Music Group, which manages rock concert venues. - BBC
"The website was restored at around 1:30 p.m. on Thursday, and ticket sales have resumed after more than a week of chaos. Met Opera on Demand, the company's popular subscription streaming platform, has also been restored. ... The Met Opera normally processes more than $200,000 worth of tickets each day." - Gothamist/WNYC
The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) has documented many of the words that these new communities of English speakers have added to the vocabulary. - The Guardian
The National Gallery of Australia is headed for a financial cliff next year and contemplating drastic measures including forced redundancies, the closure of the Canberra building two days a week and the possible reintroduction of entry fees. - Sydney Morning Herald
The fact that people protest when they don’t accept the outcome of the democratic process is a rather clear sign that protests are a non-democratic activity at best, and at worst an attempt to override and undermine democracy itself. - 3 Quarks Daily
Why haven’t we seen greater change after all that effort? The simple answer is that most institutions have thousands of works in their collection but only collect dozens per year. - Artnet
The Orion quartet was formed in 1987 by violinists Daniel Phillips and Todd Phillips, brothers who share the first violin chair equally, and cellist Timothy Eddy with the original violist Catherine Metz. - The Strad
