Posted on 06/07/2004 6:43:16 AM PDT by Valin
Leni
Thanks, I'll give it a try.
Glad you like it!
That station is the "little station that could". When they were just starting out, you could barely hear them outside the Raliegh area and they had fundraisers every few months to stay on the air....staffed by all volunteers. Now look at 'em: on the net, on cable. They even have affiliates!
Remember: If NPR doesn't do it, Who will? </ sarcasm>
Not so far fetched, to this day whenever I hear a Strauss waltz I get an image of Bugs Bunny smacking Elmer Fudd and running away, or whenever I hear The Barber of Saville, I think of that one episode where he was dressed as a barber. Classic stuff LOL.
Leni
But the combined budgets for the National Endowment for the Arts, The National Endowment for the Humanities and the Corp. for Public Broadcasting is less than a billion dollars. When we're talking about a multi-trillion dollar budget, this sound a bit petty.
I don't begrudge the arts a dime of money. A 1% increase in the efficiency of government spending—not cutting back, just streamlining the system and making is cost effective—would provide enough money to double arts funding in the U.S. without touch a single program currently in place.
This goes back to what I said much earlier in this thread. Government spend on the arts reminds of going to the grocery store. Mom and Dad have the case of beer and bottle of wine, steaks and expensive food, then get mad at the children for placing a piece of penny candy on the counter.
Am I putting the Cart before the horse? Perhaps, but in many small towns across the U.S., the arts mean huge business.
Parke County Indiana is a great example. This county has virtually now industry to speak of (17.6% of all jobs). There are about 17,000 people. The land is pretty with lots of trees rivers and small hills.
What Parke County has more than any other place on the planet is covered bridges. There are 23 covered bridges in the country, and every October, more than 3 million people visit Parke County for the Covered Bridge Festival.
Why do I brings this up? Because most of what is sold at the covered bridge festival are arts and crafts. Quilts, water colors, leather work, stitching, pottery (we have great clay in this region), and more.
This county and its many tiny communities make money from their arts. Several individuals have received NEA grants ($250 to $500), or NEH grants. These monies are used to preserve quilting techniques handed down generation after generation.
The arts generate tourism. According the figures from both the Indiana DOC and the US DOC, tourism dollars pay back a community 100 to 1, making them one of the most efficient forms of spending in the US. I've spoke with economists, government officials, elected officials who all agree with these numbers. I would include sports in this because sports are a big part of the culture of a community.
Yet, year after year, I see state local and federal officials cutting back on spending for the arts and for tourism. In many regards, it reminds me of the debate in Congress on whether the US should accept the Smithson collection. "Why would anyone want to travel to see this?" was the prime argument against acceptance. But people do. Million and millions do each year.
By the way, there is thinking that Art may have founded civilization. The potter would set up his or her workshop around a location suitable for the trade--location of the proper soil, wood for a kiln, water, then begin making his or her pots. the Potter had to be in a permanent location because that's where the stuff was needed to make the pots.
As the potter traded his good for the goods of others, some of these traders stayed put as well. when the potters wanted to develop new colors for paints, the potters discovered smelting and that some of the rocks on the ground when heated, created pretty colors. So the Potters developed metallurgy, which lead to mining which lead to more of a community.
This is just one theory, and it may be wrong, but since you are an artist, I thought you'd like that version
Satellite radio is able to profitably address genres and tastes that are not concentrated enough in local markets to be worthwhile, but which have a substantial national market scattered across the country. Essentially the same is true of streaming web media where you can pick up practically anything from anywhere.
Local radio should and will survive, but it is no longer the only kid on the block.
Actually I've always thought it was beer; some Neanderthals left a pot of cooked grain on the kitchen counter and returned to finish it after a period of their usual marauding and hell-raising. In their absence yeast had converted it to mash. It smelled funny but so did most everything else so they ate it.
They all agreed, the next morning, that there had been something special about that pot of grains. I think this happened in either Scotland or Germany. Agriculture and civilization thus began, and from their drinking conversations came politics.
From the description of your community, it does a much better job than they do in New Jersey, or the East Coast generally where art's events are opportunities to pad vita-e's and everyone seeks contacts with New York. Scenario: state arts council announces a project for a school or other building and selects five artists they consider "appropriate." These applicants make presentations proposing their designs before a panel of mid-level bureaucrats. One of the artists lives in NJ but maintains a studio in New York. He gets the commission. Why? New York, its glamor and his contacts.
It's the Rustbelt where the arts have been employed as an urban renewal tool. Example: A building is found vacant. The architects note it's ornate steel facade and draw plans to subdivide it into studios. There's a problem however:after the graft and payback and sweetheart construction payoffs, there isn't enough to extend the sprinkler system so that each studio can have it's own sprinkler head. This is against fire codes. So they build the walls of the studios 7 feet high to comply with regulations in a way allowing them to continue using the previous sprinkler system.
These examples illustrate the mechanisms inherent in any government managed system. The individuals involved in this system are not bad; they're just useless and expensive.
I think people will continue to cherish quilts for generations, but I don't think that a gov. grant is going to make any difference; it could do harm by homogenizing regional distinctions. I suspect that the community you site was perfectly capable of mounting its festival without NEA money. If the return for arts spending is so lucrative no business would fail to make that investment.
You have strong allies, Bill Buckley for one. He argues that Arts funding is compatible with responsibilities of the government to maintain public memorials: statues, historical places and the like. He's on solid ground there. And I think that arts, especially music, absolutely belong in the public school system. And I'll agree that it's perfectly OK for a community or state to spend money to attract tourism. But art for art's sake is not supportable.
Bad news for you: Lenny was, er, uh, you know....
And Aaron Compeland
And Samual Barber.
George Gershwin was not, I learned to my surprise. I always associated him with a kind of Art Deco decadence and considered the others more serious and high minded.
I guess it doesn't matter.
I am also a lousy speller.I caught myself mispelling Mussorgsky with FR's spell checker.
My taste is for the more modern and late romantic schools. I used to play the drums and was an avid reader of Downbeat magazine. That's probably where I heard these composers first mentioned. Music depends on contrast; dissonance sets the listener up for the harmonies like physical exertion triggers endorphin. Try "Boris Godunov" by Mussorgsky for drama. Paul Hindemith's "Mathis Der Maler" (Mathias the painter, about Grunewald's painting) has a section--I think its the first part-- that reminds me of a spring shower. Eric Satie's pieces are very evocative and alternately calming and humorous. I'd recommend Aldo Ciccolini's recordings of the piano pieces. I recall that Rimsky-Korsakov was Tchaikovsky's contemporary, and I think the former's work was obscured by the latter's fame. There's right much good film music out there too, and these guys had a big influence on cinema scoring. I think anyone who's seen watched films will find this music familiar to some degree.
You must be in Phoenix. I can't decide if I like KJZZ or not. I gave up on KYOT because they have a merry-go-round selection of about 100 jazz songs they play every day. Like that dopey "Feels So Good" by Chuck Mangione, when his "Chase the Clouds Away" or "Bellavia" is so much better. I wrote to them asking them to play something else by him, but no soap.
Happy listening!
Breaks my heart about Leonard Bernstein. He did a lot to popularize classical music (Youg's People's Concerts). He also was a great show-tune writer.
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