Symphony President Alan Valentine said patrons donated $300,000 worth of tickets since the pandemic hit. But officials anticipate an $8 million loss from the shutdown, leaving the organization several million dollars short for the year. – The Tennessean
San Antonio Symphony Music Director Sebastian Lang-Lessing: Orchestras After The Virus
“I’m very convinced that people after this are more hungry for intellectual and artistic inspiration than before. So the wrong approach, I think, is to do a populist approach to the arts industry and just play happy tunes that everybody wants to hear and nothing profound. I think that would be the wrong approach. I think it should be the extreme opposite. I think now we can challenge our audience more than before. That’s my gut feeling. And I’m not alone with that.” – San Antonio Express News
How Luminato Scrambled To Reinvent Into A Virtual Festival
“It’s not a festival in the same way a live festival is, since the conditions are completely different, our ability to present work in so many of the ways we normally do is nonexistent, our audiences can’t come out and be with us in public…I mean, most of the people who work at the festival have long careers in performing arts. We’re used to creating work for crowds of people to experience in close quarters. But it didn’t feel right to not do anything.” – Broadway World
How Museums Can Take Advantage Of Lockdown
Museums have an opportunity to make a contribution to civic discourse that plays to their intrinsic strengths. It is obvious that many of our political and civic institutions have failed in the promotion of the interests of humanity and the planet. We are entering a period where questioning the status quo ante and its values and priorities is of existential importance. – The Art Newspaper
Unions Set Conditions For Reopening Theatres. But It’s Unlikely To Happen Anytime Soon
“Clearly, we’re not bringing anybody back to work anytime soon in person, based on those guidelines,” Aurora Managing Director Julie Saltzman Kellner told The Chronicle by phone. “To be honest, we weren’t anyways. They are really similar to the guidelines we had set out for ourselves, in terms of when we imagined we could produce again.” – San Francisco Chronicle
When Will It Be Safe To Return To The Dance Studio?
Put simply, dancers who aren’t ready to go back shouldn’t have to. As desperately as we miss dancing, we have to put our health—and the health of our communities—first. But as artists who often lack employment protections, it may feel risky to draw a line in the sand. – Dance Magazine
Here Are Hollywood’s New Production Rules For Shooting During Pandemic
The instructions detail how to deal with a confirmed case of COVID-19 on a set. Anyone in the cast or crew that was within six feet of the infected person for more than 15 minutes may need to be quarantined, potentially bringing a complete halt to filming. The name of the ill employee must not be disclosed, according to the rules. Physical distancing will be required, which will be a challenge for crowded sets. – Los Angeles Times
Sonny Rollins On Surviving A Pandemic
“This is O.K. for me because I am trying to live in a different world, besides the world of the illness. I’m trying to live in a world of the spirit wherein I am concentrating on things such as the golden rule. This is my big thing; I am trying to live by it. The main thing is do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Sure, everybody knows it, but nobody lives by it. We live in a world where it’s about “I’ve gotta get mine, and—too bad for you—I’ve gotta get mine first.” – The New Yorker
#TakeTwoKnees And The Art Of Transforming Familiar Music In Troubled Times
Anthony McGill, New York Philharmonic principal clarinetist, launched a new mini-genre of musical protest on May 28 when he tweeted a video of himself playing “America the Beautiful,” transposed into a minor key, in honor of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, and “the struggle for justice and decency.” David Patrick Stearns surveys some #TakeTwoKnees responses and some similar musical repurposings from earlier years — from Leonard Bernstein’s famous Beethoven 9th at the fallen Berlin Wall to Jimi Hendrix’s “Star-Spangled Banner” at Woodstock to Judy Garland on live TV transforming “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” into a funeral march for JFK. – WQXR (New York City)
Banff Centre Permanently Fires 284 Staff
On Thursday, management laid off 284 staff members, some of whom had worked there for decades and lived in campus housing. An additional 100 people remain on temporary layoff, leaving 123 fully employed. – CBC
Perhaps The Perfect American Artist For This Moment Is One Who’s Been Working For Six Decades
The themes of racial (in)equality and (in)justice that are now starting to get the attention they deserve have been material for Faith Ringgold for her entire career. Yet, faced with the death of her husband this winter and the coronavirus epidemic, this prolific 89-year-old artist found herself creatively paralyzed. Then George Floyd was murdered, the nation erupted in outrage, and Ringgold got back to work. – The New York Times
Awkward: It Appears Netflix Trademarked “Space Force” Before The US Military
The streaming platform’s trademark for “Space Force” dates back to January 2019. The US military’s space warfare service of the same name was founded in December, eleven months later, without ever having registered a trademark for its name. – Futurism
The Pragmatic Art Of The Post-Pandemic Concert
As COVID-19 gets more and more contained on the island, the National Symphony Orchestra of Taiwan is moving back into live performance, gradually increasing the numbers of both musicians and attendees while keeping safety measures in place. NSOT music director Shao-Chia Lü and executive director Wen-Chen Kuo talk about the logistics involved. – Van
YouTube Establishes $100 Million Fund To Support Black Creatives
The video platform is launching the multi-year initiative to fund content hosted on the site “to center and amplify Black voices and perspectives,” as YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki put it in a statement on the company’s official blog. The first work supported by the new program will be a multi-hour benefit, featuring roundtables and performances, streaming on Saturday (June 13) under the title Bear Witness, Take Action. – Variety
Archaeologist Sentenced To Two Years In Prison For Fabricating Find
“The discoveries were little short of miraculous: pieces of third-century pottery engraved with one of the first depictions of the crucified Christ, along with Egyptian hieroglyphics, and with Basque words that predated the earliest known written examples of the language by 600 years.” No miracles here, though: there were serious anachronisms in the engravings as well as traces of modern glue. Archaeologist Eliseo Gil and two collaborators were convicted of fraud in a Spanish court. – The Guardian
Pandemic Has Hurt Theatre In UK Worse Than In US Or Canada: Study
The research by TRG Arts and Purple Seven found that, compared to the same period in 2019, ticket revenue fell by 71% in North America and by 92% in the United Kingdom over two weeks in March. The key difference seems to be deeper audience loyalty in North America. – American Theatre
Artists Leading
George Floyd art gathered May 31 – June 11 in Over-the-Rhine and downtown Cincinnati – Margy Waller