“Think of it like traffic. There’s the language road, there’s the music road, there’s the seeing road, there’s the images road. Language is like a superhighway; it makes the other things wait for it. It puts a stoplight on the others. But when language deteriorates a little bit — which happens at the beginning of this disease — it becomes less dominant. There is a golden moment when these things are more in balance.” – San Francisco Classical Voice
Liz Lerman Talks Movement & Discord
The choreographer, performer, writer, educator, and speaker shares her creative process and the connection between movement and discord. – Aaron Dworkin
The Latest Dance Craze Sweeping The World
Jerusalema is a song by South African house musician Master KG. Friends in Angola filmed themselves dancing to the hit – the moves have since been recreated the world over. From health workers to nuns to children, everyone is getting involved. – ITV
The Five-Second Error In The “Nutcracker” Score
He suspects the engraver made the mistake while copying the score, and it didn’t get caught during proofreading. If Tchaikovsky noticed, there’s no indication of it in his correspondence around that time, according to Schwarm, the historian. – San Diego Union-Tribune
Rauschenberg, Twombly And Johns – A Great Art Love Triangle
Rauschenberg and Twombly were both southerners. Rauschenberg, who was quarter Cherokee, came from Texas, Twombly from the heart of the old Confederacy in Lexington, Virginia. The passion of their relationship is beautifully preserved in black and white photographs that Rauschenberg took on a visit to Rome in 1952. – The Guardian
The Chamber Music Series Getting Ten Times Its Usual Audience (And Making Money)
There’s one metric, however, that stands out as a marker of success. Philadelphia Chamber Music Society’s virtual concerts are technically free of charge, but the pay-as-you-wish donation model has drawn real money — an average of $7,500 in donations per concert. This sum is at roughly equal to the paid ticket revenue PCMS typically collected pre-pandemic at APS for a concert by a popular artist. – Philadelphia Inquirer
Rupert Neve, ‘The Man Who Made The Recording Console,’ 94
The Grammy-winning architect of modern music “is best known for designing and producing microphone preamplifiers, equalizers, compressors and mixing consoles that are sought after in the industry. His designs are staples everywhere from large production facilities to home studios, and have even been reproduced as computer plug-ins to become more accessible for all music lovers and creators.” – Variety
How Can ‘Our Town’ Still Feel Utterly Contemporary, 80 Years After Its Opening?
Howard Sherman, author of a new book about the play: “It’s a play that people think they know. People want to paint it as this old-fashioned love letter to the past. And that’s not what it is at all.” – NPR
So, No Spring Openings For Broadway, But You Can Find Some Gems, Safely, Online
All of this is true: “An effort to keep the industry alive has major stars taking to the virtual stage and much-lauded past productions available for streaming. These productions can’t compare with the energy of a full theater, but what they make up in accessibility is something that can’t be underestimated.” – The New York Times
Disneyland Artist And ‘Master Illustrator’ Charles Boyer, 86
Boyer signed on with Disney as a sketch artist in 1960 – and never left. “Boyer was made a Disney Legend in 2005, the equivalent of membership in the company’s Hall of Fame, with a window on Main Street in his name. Not bad for someone who put himself through Chouinard Art Institute as a janitor on a ‘working scholarship.’ Or for an artist who was color-blind.” – Los Angeles Times
What The New Movie ‘Judas And The Black Messiah’ Reveals About The United States’ History – And Present
In short, and in no surprise to anyone who has studied the history of the U.S., or indeed lived that history: “Judas and the Black Messiah makes an urgent case for why the FBI, and, by extension, American law enforcement, must change priorities. Violence from white extremists poses a far greater threat to the country’s safety than activism from groups that seek to improve the living conditions of the most marginalized people.” – The Atlantic
When Science Doesn’t Cut It
Director Iram Parveen Bilal (I’ll Meet You There) explains: “I’m the daughter of a physicist mother and a chemistry professor father. … We were told from the get-go that education is your passport. And when I came to Caltech, I realized that even though I was good at science, it came naturally to me, it wasn’t ticking the passion clock. I wanted to interact with people. I was in the subbasement of an applied physics lab in Caltech, you know, streaming DNA strands on semiconductor chips.” Hence, film school. – NPR
Missing ‘Bridgerton’? Turn To TikTok
First there was Ratatouille: The Musical or Ratatousical, which raised more than a million dollars for actors, with the no doubt bemused blessing of Disney. Then TikTok went sea chanty. Now? It’s Bridgerton: The Musical. (Bridgertousical?) “Barlow and Bear’s frequent postings on social media have drawn lots of attention, including from Bridgerton cast members. And the pair says they’ve been approached by several people in the entertainment industry about developing the project professionally.” – NPR
Legendary Casting Director Lynn Stalmaster Has Died At 93
You know his work even if you don’t know of the man. “Stalmaster’s accomplishments are too numerous to list exhaustively, but among them: He became the first casting director to receive an honorary Oscar in 2016; he was the first casting director to receive a solo title card in a film’s credits, for The Thomas Crown Affair (1968); he cast about 400 films and TV shows from 1955-2017; and he helped launch the careers of countless actors who went on to be major stars.” – Los Angeles Times
The Modernist Poet Who Understood The Precarity Of Civilization
Aime Césaire, whose Discourse on Colonialism remains (all too) relevant – and who protested to some effect in 2005after French President Jacques Chirac instructed schools to teach about the “positive role” of colonialism – was also “an imaginative writer who molded the French language to make a personal poetry characterized by hypnotic physicality, ritualized anguish, and metaphorical exorcisms.” – Hyperallergic
The Secret Life Of Museums During Lockdowns In The UK
Each lockdown has meant something different for the staff, especially of science and natural history museums. For instance, James Maclaine, senior fish curator at London’s Natural History Museum, has to keep the flesh-eating beetles alive and make sure the freezers are running. “We have a lot of material in freezers which we haven’t been able to process yet and if anything goes wrong there it would be extremely unpleasant for all concerned.” – BBC
The Indianapolis Museum Of Art’s Job Ad Asked Director To Maintain A ‘Traditional, Core, White Audience,’ Which Did Not Go Over Well
The explanation of the current CEO and director of the Indianapolis Museum didn’t, perhaps, help. Charles L. Venable said that “the decision to use ‘white’ had been intentional, and [he] explained that it had been intended to indicate that the museum would not abandon its existing audience as part of its efforts toward greater diversity, equity and inclusion.” – The New York Times
How A Few Women, In Just A Couple Of Years, Changed The Course Of Art In The U.S.
Women Artists for Revolution (W.A.R., of course) weren’t shy about their rallying cry in 1969. “The group ignited a robust movement against gender discrimination within, and widespread exclusion from, New York City’s patriarchal art industry, particularly by galleries and museums who saw art made by women as inherently illegitimate and therefore ineligible for serious consideration.” – Hyperallergic