Painter Jennifer Morgan’s “Wild West” exhibition is at the Belmont Hotel in Oak Cliff, the North Texas Jazz Festival is at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Addison and Gini is at the mike for more events. [Audio clip: view full post to listen]

… now big-city newspapers, alternative weeklies, even magazines are cutting their film critics. As with the loss of the other reviewers, it means the independent art work, the one with no big-budget corporate marketing behind it, will have a harder time finding an audience.

Modern Art Notes blogger Tyler Green was thrilled by Intimate Modernism, the Amon Carter’s current show of pioneering Fort Worth artists from the ’40s and ’50s, because it wasn’t just another museum’s “pursuit of the Now” but an attempt to make sense of the recent past. He plans on writing about it more.

Celebrated young pianist Lang Lang performed last night at Bass Hall. The Dallas Morning News’ classical music critic Scott Cantrell does not share the popular adoration of Lang’s skills. I saw a Lang performance with the San Antonio Symphony several years ago and also found him surprisingly ham-fisted but chalked it up to youthful spirits [...]

The New Amazons of the Avant-Garde is at the Museum of Geometric and MADI Art,  the Taste of Chaos metal tour is at the Nokia and the First Tuesday Social Action Film Festival screens In Debt We Trust, an examination of Congress and the credit industry. And all credit to Gini for bringing us even more events.
[Audio clip: [...]

KERA feature story on Greendale
The Dallas Morning News review of Greendale

As presented by the Undermain Theatre, Neil Young’s  Greendale is a hellacious piece of rock ‘n’ roll.  This may be heresy, but music director Kenny Withrow and his band actually sound better than Young’s original recordings — crisper and richer. This baby kicks; you’re not likely to hear a [...]

Eddie Izzard (brilliant British comedian, star of the cable series, The Riches) is at the Majestic Theatre, hotshot young pianist Lang Lang is at Bass Hall in Fort Worth and the gallery show, “Unnatural Disasters,” is at University of Texas at Dallas: Not bad for a Monday. 
[Audio clip: view full post to listen]

The sixth time was the charm. Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde completed its run at the Metropolitan Opera on Friday night with Ben Heppner and Deborah Voigt finally together onstage. In contrast to the five previous performances, this one seemed to be (almost) trouble free. Read the New York Times‘ account.

The members of Gravitas Quartet (Wayne Horvitz on piano, cellist Peggy
Lee, trumpet player Ron Miles and bassoonist Sara Schoenbeck) each have
notable experience in both classical and jazz music and composer Wayne
Horvitz has created a unique repertoire for the band that combines a
chamber music approach with room for improvisation.
Horvitz has composed for [...]

… aren’t all that much better than American kids’. Teenage girl magazines, song lyrics and computer game “cheat codes” found online are top choices. But then, so’s C. S. Lewis’ The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.