ArtsJournal Conversation on Creative Rights & Artists

This week, the venerable ArtsJournal is hosting (with Fractured Atlas, Future of Music Coalition, and the National Alliance for Media Arts + Culture) a discussion about artists’ creative rights and arts policy / advocacy more generally. I’m one of 22 featured bloggers, along with my Fractured Atlas colleague Justin Karr and some other great voicesRead More

Eighth Blackbird Gets It Right

Earlier this year, I wrote some critical words about Chicago-based chamber music ensemble eighth blackbird’s composer competition that offered only a $1000 prize despite an abnormally high $50 entry fee for composers. While steep entry fees for artistic competitions are problematic no matter who is charging them, it struck many in the composition community asRead More

Look mom, I’m on the radio

Here’s the audio from my appearance on Rosetta Thurman’s “All Nonprofits Considered” talk show with Colleen Dilenschneider earlier today. It was a lot of fun and we covered considerable ground: the justifications for subsidizing the arts, what counts as “art,” audience demographic trends, how arts organizations are faring in the recession, leadership development and transitionRead More

New Blogs!

Here’s what’s new with the blogroll: Good Intentions Are Not Enough has a new URL and feed. Still not the most easy-to-type web address, but it’s an improvement over the last one… GiveWell has moved from givewell.net to givewell.org. Feeds should still work for the GiveWell Blog. I’ve removed several apparently inactive blogs from theRead More

Four Days in Charm City

Whew! I am not sure why seemingly every single arts service organization feels compelled to schedule their annual conferences in June, but it sure makes for a lively travel schedule for schlubs like me. This time around, I was in Baltimore for the Americans for the Arts Half-Century Summit, a much-hyped event indeed. I hadRead More

What do (orchestra people) want to fight for?

(Originally published at Orchestra R/Evolution) I’ve intentionally held off from commenting on the (really interesting) discussion until now, because I wanted to see how it developed. And boy, did this discussion start off with a bang of depressing self-flagellation. I tell you, it’s not often one will come to an industry conference and hear peopleRead More

Advocating for the arts in RI

Last Wednesday, I took a couple of hours out of my work day to stop by a hearing at the Rhode Island State House on proposed cuts to the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts (RISCA). Rhode Island’s Republican Governor, Don Carcieri, proposed the elimination of RISCA’s discretionary grants budget, the provision requiring thatRead More

New Blogs!

As with last time, a number of the blogs that Createquity links to have recently changed addresses. This time, it’s mostly philanthropy-oriented sources that are the culprit. Here’s a brief round-up for those who may be unwittingly be missing out on the action: The blog of Springboard for the Arts, Springblog, has moved. Here isRead More

Sometimes all you have to do to is ask

So last week, I tried a little experiment. I’ve been wondering for a while what to do about my weekly series “Around the Horn.” It’s the only thing I write for Createquity that’s on a timed schedule (every Monday), and as I’ve cut back my level of writing somewhat due to my new job, IRead More

Flashback: Drum Cells

Since a lot of people taking the survey didn’t know what the “Flashback series” was, here’s a little refresher: every so often, I like to post an audio clip here to remind people (and myself, I suppose) that I once was and may be again a composer of musical compositions and impresario of artistic endeavors.Read More