Lobenthal.com

Seems that Paul Ryan brought some of his of his trademark charts and graphs to his detente meeting with Trump–you know, one wave of those charts and graph and the “mainstream” “news” media instantly swoon into submission.

I wonder if Trump fell under their spell as well?

Of course, when Paul Krugman or someone else legitimate with the ability to actually analyze those charts and graphs sits down and crunches them. . . . surprise!

Ryan’s charts and graphs invariably turn out to be the flimsiest, most fraudulent possible non-corroboration of Ryan’s budgetary claims.

At the fabulous 125th anniversary gala last night it became evident that someone has turned up the forced air in the auditorium, quite probably as part of the recently-completed overhaul of the backstage facilities.  There is now an audible white noise that takes the edge off bass and treble and everything in between.  Please — emergency — turn down the forced air, at least when the show is ongoing!

As for the gala, management did a great job selecting performers to highlight the Hall’s incredible diverse history, from sublime chamber music of Ax, Ma and Lang Lang, to the supercharged pop of Michael Feinstein and, incredibly, brought all the performers together at the end of the show for a rousing encore.

Here is NY1’s coverage:

http://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/arts/2016/05/5/richard-gere–yo-yo-ma-among-those-celebrating-carnegie-hall-s-125th-anniversary.html

And Chinese television:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=itUO0KUNawQ

Was great to hear from the legendary Marilyn Horne and Martina Arroyo.  Horne’s Bernstein-conducted Carmen and Arroyo’s Lady Macbeth (substituting for Christa Ludwig, who declined to repeat in New York her success in Vienna the year before) opposite Sherrill Milnes Thane were highlights of the 1973 season.   The Carmen featured a memorable coup de theatre  — the house flipping from black to blinding white light on those first chords after the overture, literally dazzling the audience, pupils having dialated during the darkened-house overture, everyone blinking and shielding their eyes from the stage.   The Arroyo-Milnes Macbeth was a revival of the 1959 Caspar Nehar-designed expressionist set (original production with Leonie Rysanek (substituting for fired Maria Callas) and Leonard Warren, recorded in the studio by RCA) reflecting Bing’s German/Austrian roots and the Met’s strong ties to the Glyndebourne aesthetic of the 1930’s.  Nehar and Carl Ebert had designed Glyndebourne’s 1938 Macbeth.  Everything is connected after all.

Among other treasures too numerous to name (including Hoppers painted in North Truro and a Gutenberg Bible) is the coin collection featuring one bearing the aviary likenesses of the Capitoline Triad — the holy trinity of the Romans, consisting of Jupiter/eagle, Juno/peacock and Minerva/owl.

According to Wikipedia, the Roman religious triad (see Georges Dumézil) revived the Proto-Indo-European religious “trifunctional” model.  The highest deity (Jupiter) is endowed with religious, magic and legal powers and prerogatives; the next highest deity (Minerva) represents braveness and military prowess; and the third (Juno) embodies common human worldly values such as fertility.  Such a tripartite structure exists in religion and myths from India to Scandinavia and Ireland. It had disappeared from most societies other than India since prehistoric times until revival in ancient Rome.

Can the same be said of the performing arts?  Is there a tripartite hierarchy of magic, prowess, and connection to common human worldly values? If so, where in that hierarchy does dance stand? These questions are critical to understanding dance as a form of ecstatic expression.  Your thoughts much appreciated.

Don’t forget to stop in at Sal’s or Pepe’s Pizza on Wooster Square.  Pepe’s “original” is cheeseless except for a touch of parmesan.

That view of Cape Cod bay was mine every August from 1970-1973. . .

Late afternoon light.

Other magical coastal destinations:  Mystic Seaport; Eugene O’Neill “Monte Cristo Cottage” in New London, CT; The Breakers in Newport, RI; the Yale Art Gallery and the Yale Rep, where Dianne Weist is featured in Samuel Beckett’s “Happy Days.”

Another great place to be in springtime!

Just a few miles southeast from where the ancestors — John Alden, Priscilla Mullens, and possibly Samuel Fuller (the only Mayflower passenger known to have owned a slave, the Native American “Joel”) — touched down after an uneventful crossing from Leiden, Holland, via Plymouth, England, to escape the corruption of the church and of the world in general, all at the urging of their gentle pastor (ancestor John Robinson, who did not make the crossing, but remained in Holland to tend to the rest of the flock deemed to frail to cross), here is the most beautiful house in the world.  It is mostly in shadow because facing west, the morning sun on the ocean side of Cape Cod.  In Provincetown, no lines, everything mostly closed, whales frolicking off Herring Cove beach.  What a great time to visit the Cape.

Not in the book, but I love Wilde’s recollection of Nicholas Magallanes in Serenade:

When he appeared in the final movement together with Waltz ballerina and Dark Angel, “it was like they were walking across the sky.”

William Rivers Pitt, writing superbly as usual for Truth Out, reminded us eighteen-months ago that President Obama’s former top counterterrorism adviser, Daniel Benjamin

“describes the ramped-up depiction of the alleged ISIS threat as a ‘farce’ peddled by ‘members of the cabinet and top military officers all over the place describing the threat in lurid terms that are not justified.'”

And, beloved members of the arts community, if you wonder how that relates to your nearly-total defunding by the U.S. government, I suggest you don’t have that much to wonder about.

“Get ready for more folded flags,” Pitts writes today, “and more economic collapse as our hard-earned tax dollars, and our children and theirs, are fed into the frictionless machine of eternal war.”

What’s being done in our name, with our money, and at the cost of our international reputation and security:

Nicholas JS Davies at Common Dreams reports on our escalating air strikes in Syria and Iraq and the escalating civilian casualties.