Free Articles (A Selection) 
The Bangarra Dance Theatre Dances ‘Terrain’(0)
Nature doesn’t really impose physical restrictions on our free will, but rather demonstrates the movements best suited to us; these too are the most beautiful. They are not an imposed law but very much individual. There is an ingenuity to discovering them and in so doing one pushes against them, but the effortful courage of pushing them can be a misplaced nobility, and while there is a certain inherent dramatic tension there, it can become awkward. There is a certain quality in today’s contemporary dance style, though there are many original variations and exceptions, which is hardly naturalistic in the way it pushes the extremes of human ability. The Bangarra Dance Theatre is in a unique position in urban Sydney, close to the Contemporary Dance World (sometimes called a “Mafia,” but let’s try to be positive), but also with close ancestral ties which give them access to the preserved ancient Australian arts which developed in unique ways in their isolation.
Dan Zhu triumphs, Christoph Eschenbach conducts the BSO at Tanglewood in Leonard Bernstein’s Serenade after Plato’s Symposium and Tchaikovsky’s “Pathétique”
I was looking forward to this concert to renew my acquaintance with this less familiar, but interesting work of Leonard Bernstein’s and in the expectation that Christoph Eschenbach and the BSO would give us an interesting “Pathétique” after Myung-Whun Chung’s fascinating, rather eccentric reading of last November.
Developers’ Rule: A New Plan for Planning in New South Wales
A true story: one day at the New South Wales Department of Planning two planners are talking about different theories of urban planning. ‘Neoliberal planning,’ the first says, “that’s what we do.” “No kidding,” the other replies.
“No kidding” might be replaced by “yer darn tootin” after the release of the NSW Government’s A New Planning System for New South Wales – Green Paper. If the title doesn’t quite grab you, a new planning system, however boring, will have a far greater impact on people’s lives than more juicy topics like a new Museum of Contemporary Art or a new pavilion for the Venice Biennale. Planning is the most visible juncture at which architecture meets politics, and what the Government is proposing is interesting for the way that it reveals urban planning as the point where conservatism begins to conflict with itself, where a libertarian sensibility runs counter to pro-business economic rationalist conservatism. The development industry is not quite a friend of the invisible hand; it does best when certain freedoms are curtailed. This was shown most clearly in the US by the Supreme Court’s decision in Kelo v. City of New London, which expanded the Constitution’s “Takings Clause” (“nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation”) to allow governments to claim eminent domain for purposes of private redevelopment.
Tanglewood 75th Anniversary Celebration in the Music Shed, a Review
In this special version of the popular annual “Tanglewood on Parade” concert, the 75th anniversary of the festival as we know it (more or less) was duly celebrated. On August 5, 1937, the Boston Symphony Orchestra performed an all-Beethoven concert under Music Director Serge Koussevitzky. (I have already mentioned this in my review of the commemorative repreise of the same program on July 6.) This was the first concert of the Berkshire Symphonic Festival, as it was then known, both with the Boston Symphony and on the same property, Tanglewood, which has been the home of the orchestra ever since.
More in this category
- Romantic Stravinsky, Wagnerian Brahms: Andris Nelsons’ Boston Symphony Debut at Tanglewood
- Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony: Schoenberg and Beethoven at Davies Hall
- Williamstown Theatre Festival’s Opening Set: Lucy Boyle’s The Blue Deep and Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest
- An Orchestra for All Seasons: Dvorak’s Faith, Schuller’s Dream, Prokofiev’s Shakespeare