In fact, outside North America and Europe, 78s were the standard record format well into the 1960s, and they hold an enormous variety of music from the days before globalization. A new anthology titled An Alternate History of the World’s Music presents old recordings from places as disparate as Myanmar, Zanzibar, Ecuador, Albania, and Okinawa. – The Guardian
Public Radio And TV Face Looming Shortage Of Broadcast Engineers
“The workforce of broadcast engineers — those who know to fix broadcast transmitters, tubes and wires — is reaching retirement age. … Far fewer skilled young people are waiting in the wings to take on their roles. The apprenticeships that provided training to the engineers who are now approaching retirement are increasingly rare.” And perpetually strapped public broadcasting stations have trouble affording salaries high enough to attract what candidates are available. – Current
With No Mardi Gras Parade, New Orleans Creates Floats Out Of Houses
“Look around Rona, socially distanced float houses have become a thing. A really big thing. Apparently, if you to take the parades off our streets, our streets become the parade. From Gretna to Metairie to Bywater: Lavishly, lovingly, laughingly decorated houses are becoming as ubiquitous as potholes.” – NOLA.com
Is Choreography Is Protected By U.S. Copyright? Yes And No
It’s a messy enough business that the first commercial choreography for a pop music video (an industry where you’d think there’s enough money involved to have figured this out years ago) to get copyrighted was only last July. (It was JaQuel Knight’s moves for Beyoncé’s “Single Ladies”.) Steven Vargas gives readers some background in American copyright law, hints for choreographers who want to get their dances registered, and suggestions for what Congress could do to fix the problems. – Dance Magazine
The Genius Equation (Or How You Can Become One)
“If you’re a prodigy with a great gift for something, you can simply do it – yet might not be aware of why and how. And you don’t ask questions. Indeed, the geniuses I met seemed too preoccupied with committing acts of genius to consider the cause of their creative output. Maybe an outsider looking in has a clearer overview of how the magic gets done.” – Aeon
Wigmore Hall’s Free Streamed Lockdown Concerts Have Been Quite A Success. They’re Also Expensive.
The performances — by such well-known artists as Mitsuko Uchida, Steven Isserlis, and the choir Stile Antico — cost about £3,000 each for personnel and copyright payments, and that doesn’t include artists’ fees. This while the venue has had no ticket income for months on end. On the other hand, viewers have donated £750,000 so far, and Wigmore’s membership numbers are up 25%. – The Strad
New Online Dictionary Tracks History Of Science Fiction Vocabulary
“The Historical Dictionary of Science Fiction includes some 1,800 separate entries, from actifan and aerocar to zero-gravity and zine. … A historical dictionary devoted to the history of something as future-oriented (and imaginary) as science fiction may seem like a contradiction in terms. But then science fiction has always had a curious relationship to the real world, said Jesse Sheidlower, its editor.” – The New York Times
A Need For Orchestras To Be More Nimble In Scheduling
Until the arrival of the coronavirus, the prevalent model was not particularly friendly to rapid response. Symphony orchestras did a good deal of planning two or three years in advance, although that was mostly big-picture stuff — there was still plenty of room for changes at the detail level. – San Francisco Chronicle
‘It’s Muybridge on Steroids’: Herman Cornejo And A ‘Photo-Scientist’ Make A Totally Different Dance Video
In DANCELIVE by Herman Cornejo, shot by Steven Sebring using his specially developed in-the-round camera system, viewers can “watch [dancers] from up close and see their movements from all sides and different angles, the visual equivalent of surround sound. … QR codes … will allow viewers to use their phones to interact with the online images, moving them forward and back, or to convert them into augmented reality. … In time, the two artists hope to create a virtual performance space, building upon the capabilities of video game platforms.” – The New York Times
New Access: Super High Resolution Images Of Raphael’s Sistine Chapel Drawings
The V&A partnered with the Factum Foundation to create the high-resolution color, infrared and 3-D scans in 2019. And last year, in honor of the 500th anniversary of Raphael’s death, the museum refurbished the cartoons’ gallery, known as the Raphael Court, by repainting the walls, replacing light fixtures and taking other steps to make the cartoons “more visible and legible to in-person visitors.” – Smithsonian
What Happens To Whistleblowers Who Outed Their Arts Organizations?
After the open letters are published, the articles are out, and the declarations are made on social media, what happens to the people behind them? Artnet News spoke with a number of whistleblowers to find out what followed their news-making efforts and the emotional costs of going public. – Artnet
Season Three Of ‘Serial’ Is Headed To HBO
“The third season of the award-winning podcast, which arguably set in motion the current boom for non-fiction audio series, was set in the Cleveland justice system. Unlike the first two seasons, which featured one case, it looked at the system overall.” HBO’s adaptation, a limited series, will focus on one Cleveland police officer and the young man he’s accused of beating. (Among the executive producers is basketball superstar Lebron James.) – Deadline
What Small Chicago Arts Groups Have Learned About Working Online
Before the pandemic, in-person classes offered by the Remy Bumppo Theatre Company tended to be small, with only 8 to 10 students. But over the last months, the theater has dropped prices between 50% and 80% and, it wrote, watched enrollment triple. – Chicago Tribune
Running The Prix De Lausanne Ballet Competition Despite The Pandemic
Since this year’s 78 contestants from 20 countries can’t travel to Switzerland, they’re submitting pre-recorded videos. The jury members (masked and socially distanced, of course) will meet in Lausanne to watch and judge those videos together, keeping to the same schedule they would in a normal year. – Pointe Magazine
Stand-Up Comedian Jailed For Jokes He Hadn’t Told Yet
On New Year’s Day, Munawar Faruqui, a rising talent in India’s relatively new comedy circuit, was starting off a two-week tour with a gig in Indore when the leader of a Hindu extremist group accused Faruqui, who is Muslim, of “insulting religious sentiments” (a crime in India) and had him arrested. He had not yet even started his routine. Two courts have denied him bail, and the police say releasing him would cause “a law-and-order situation.” – BBC
‘A $75 Million Bet That The Future Of Photography Won’t Always Involve Cameras’
“Leading stock photography company Shutterstock announced today that it has acquired TurboSquid, a digital media company that sells 3D assets, for $75 million. The move is both a talent and an IP acquisition, and it will give Shutterstock’s two million customers … access to raw materials for making images from scratch.” – Fast Company
In Rape Case, Filmmaker Luc Besson Is — Well, Not Exonerated, Exactly …
The charge by actress Sand Van Roy was first made in May 2018; it was dismissed for lack of evidence nine months later, and subsequently reopened following a civil complaint by Van Roy. After a five-hour hearing in Paris this week, the judge declared Besson an “assisted witness,” a status under French law which means there is currently not enough evidence to prosecute but that the case may proceed if new evidence should emerge. – Variety
Pompeii’s Museum Is Completely Open For First Time In Decades
“The Antiquarium, a museum located on the ruins of the ancient city of Pompeii, fully reopened this week for the first time in more than 40 years. Home to some of the razed settlement’s best-preserved artifacts, including protective amulets and plaster casts of Mount Vesuvius’s victims, the museum will host a permanent display narrating Pompeii’s history. – Smithsonian Magazine
When Everything Is Seen Through A Screen, What Is Theatre?
“Digital performance has only exacerbated the definitional crises during this year of hard and soft quarantine. At a recent UCLA roundtable on the subject of the future of theater, I came to the conclusion that, even in this pioneering moment in which artists from different time zones can collaborate without ever coming into direct contact, place still matters.” – Los Angeles Times
Andreas Delfs Named Music Director Of Rochester Philharmonic
The 61-year-old conductor spent a dozen years as music director of the Milwaukee Symphony (1997-2009). “Once reportedly accustomed to a few sellout audiences a year, the orchestra reportedly sold out 30 shows within a year of his arrival.” – WXXI (Rochester, NY)
The Case For Simpler Grant-Giving
“Are we giving to organizations that are actually doing the best work? Or are we giving to organizations that are giving us the best grants?” – WestWord
Cable TV Cord-Cutting Accelerates During Pandemic
In the interim, expect a flood of cable programming to start migrating over to streaming in anticipation for the day when cable is no longer a viable platform for networks to reach audiences. – Axios
While Lockdown Keeps The Hordes Away, The Louvre Is Fixing Itself Up
“The world’s most visited museum — a record 10 million in 2019, mostly from overseas — is grappling with its longest closure since World War II, as pandemic restrictions keep its treasures under lock and key. But without crowds that can swell to as many as 40,000 people a day, museum officials are seizing a golden opportunity to finesse a grand refurbishment for when visitors return.” Said one senior curator, “For some projects, the lockdown has allowed us to do in five days what would have previously taken five weeks.” – The New York Times