Eveyone Loves The Biden

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After the first presidential debate--in which Obama apparently bit it--who can save the Democrats? Of course he can.

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Famous Passings This Week

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Phyllis Diller , Gong Show co-host ( among other things ), died this week. So did  Jerry Nelson , the voice of Count von Count who also had a role in Robocop 2. (Buzzfeed tribute with videos and GIFs here .) Colony Music , housed in Times Square's famous Brill building, will close in September, the same month that  The Office   starts its final season. And hippie-dippy weirdo label New Albion is going out of business too .
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Maybe Michael Kaiser Just Isn't Looking in the Right Places

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On Sequenza21, Armondo Bayalo claims that Michael Kaiser is "just plain wrong about the state of the art"--and then proceeds to tell us all the reasons why he's right. Bayalo's real point isn't that Kaiser is wrong, but that he is only right within his own big-arts frame of reference. He doesn't see all the great stuff that's going in "smaller, leaner operations" than the Kennedy Center: Fair enough, but part of the problem is that the funders and fundraisers who hold the purse strings aren't willing to invest in those grass-roots groups so that they can grow.
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Cheesy Classical Music You Should Know: Ravel's Bolero (Part II)

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Here's what Uncle Fred had to say about Ravel's Bolero : "It's the most descriptive sex music ever written." According to his niece-in-law Jenny, played by Bo Derek in 10 , "he proved it." To anyone with qualms about pedophilia (I'm firmly in this camp), Jenny's little story, meant to seduce poor hapless George (Dudley Moore), is uncomfortable, to say the least. (The whole movie gives me the creeps.) Although he was an incestuous cad, Uncle Fred had a point about Bolero . As mentioned in an earlier post , the piece opens with the snare drum playing the distinctive rhythmic pattern of the Spanish dance it's named after. The seductive flute melody that enters shortly after sets in motion a gradual blossoming to a climactic finale; as that rhythm pulses below, the melody repeats, the orchestration expands, and the music becomes ever more incessant and powerful. It's hard not to get all worked up when you listen to it. Bolero set Rav...
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