Boston Globe

Chronic back pain will cause Boston Symphony Orchestra conductor and artistic director, James Levine, to end his season in Boston. This year he has been absent for 22 performances or 60 % of his schedule. Jayce Ogren will lead the world premiere of Peter Lieberson's Songs of Love and Sorrow March 25, 26, and 27. The following week, April 1, 2, and 3 in Boston, and April 5 at Carnegie Hall in New York, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos will conduct Mendelssohn's Elijah. The conductor for the world premiere of John Harbison's Double Concerto for violin and cello on a program with Mahler's Seventh Symphony, April 8, 9, and 10, will be announced.

The low key, scaled back, modest and manageable Whitney Biennial 2010 curated by Francesco Bonami and Gary Carrion-Murayari has been dubbed the Obama Biennial. He is even on the cover. The Whitney has used this occasion to reflect on its history and critical reception since the series started in 1932. It begs questions about its mandate, the status of American art, and its relationship to a former partner, the Museum of Modern Art.

By now the cat is pretty much out of the bag. It is anticipated that Tina Packer, founding director of Shakespeare & Company, will launch the season with "Women of Will." The collage of women's roles in Shakespeare has absorbed her for 15 years. There will be a sneak preview of the work in progress on February 28.

The 2010 DeCordova Biennial, under new director, Dennis Kois, has parted from its prior annual format. It has also progressed to a mix of master artists like Otto Piene and Paul Laffoley, established artists, William Pope.L and Liz Nofzinger, and the usual blend of emerging artists. In all the museum is displaying 17 artists from all six New England states.

On September 21, 2007, in Federal District Court in Springfield, Judge Michael A. Posner ruled that Mass MoCA had not violated the artist Christoph Buchel according to the 1990 Visual Arts Rights Act. Now a Federal Appelate Court has found that the claim of copyright infringement against the museum has merit and should be heard by a federal jury. Tension mounts as the artist will indeed have his day in court.

Highlights of the 2010 Festival include the U.S. debut of The Göteborg Ballet of Sweden; three world premieres co-commissioned by Jacob's Pillow from diverse young choreographers Kyle Abraham, Monica Bill Barnes, and Camille A. Brown; U.S. premieres from Spain, India, Thailand, and Israel; and celebrated favorites including contemporary ballet company Trey McIntyre Project, the men-on-pointe offerings of Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo, and the ever-popular Hubbard Street Dance Chicago.

In the art world equivalent of musical chairs Boston's Institute of Contemporary Art has snatched its new chief curator, Helen Molesworth, from Harvard. Not long ago the ICA lost a young curator, Jen Mergel, to the MFA. What next in these musical chairs with an empty seat at Harvard which has put on indefinite hold its plans for a new modern/ contemporary museum.

While home for the holidays in the Berkshires, Martha Coakley, the front runner for the vacant U.S. Senate seat in Massachusetts, took time to greet her home town supporters in North Adams. She endorsed incoming Mayor Dick Alcombright, and he was up bright and early to return the favor.

The Boston artist/ illustrator David Omar White (1927-2009) died on June 26. He is fondly recalled by David Wilson, the publisher/ editor of Avatar, Broadside/Free Press, from their many collaborations during the turmoil of the underground press in the 1960s. Wilson started the White Rabbit comic strip which Omar took over. It later appeared in the Cambridge Phoenix, The Real Paper, and the Boston Globe. His last gallery affiliation was with Boston's former Genovese Sullivan Gallery.Though confined to a wheel chair he created and exhibited until the end.

To quote Winston Churchill during the Battle of Britain "Is this the beginning of the end or the end of the beginning?" In the coming months artistic director Tony Simotes will be charged with getting Shakespeare & Company back on track and out from under a stagering debt of $10 million.

Although Tina Packer is in the midst of a controversial production of "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf" at Boston's Publick Theatre she attended the important press conference of Shakespeare & Company convened to discuss the current fiscal crisis. It was a chance to catch up with Packer and share her insights as founding artistic director of the company.

Mid way through rehearsals for a production of "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf" at Boston's Publick Theatre it appeared that Edward Albee would not allow the play to be staged. After more than a week of chaos Tina Packer, who plays Martha, told us that the show will open as scheduled. Her performance promises to be the highlight of Boston's theatre season.

With Jack Levine and Karl Zerbe the artist Hyman Bloom, who was born in Latvia in 1913, was a founding member of the Boston Expressionists. He recently passed away at 96. Yeshiva University a memorial exhibition, through January 24, 2010, is traveling from the Danforth Museum curated by Katherine French.

Final summer series Talking Taste presents Frank McClelland proprietor of Sel de la Terre and L'Espalier that combines French culinary traditions transformed by regional ingredients.

For 26 years John Barrett has served as the Mayor of North Adams. He is running for yet another two year term. In a meeting with artists of the Eclipse Mill complex he related the epic struggle to salvage a depressed city largely through his personal efforts to help Tom Krens and then Joe Thompson in their plan to transform the abandoned Sprague Electric campus into Mass MoCA. Some $35 million in state revenue was used to renovate the museum which is celebrating its first decade.

The ripped from the headlines plot of the political thriller "State of Play" involves a philandering Congressman whose mistress/ aide gets thrown under a train in the midst of investigating a black ops paramilitary security firm bilking the goverment for billions. Sounds familiar? Add to that an editor presiding over a shrinking news room investigating the scandal. The film with a terrific cast proves to be predictable but thoroughly entertaining.

Responding to universal outrage, Brandeis University has delayed its decision to close the Rose Art Museum and sell its renowned contemporary collection and Pop Art masterpieces. At least for now as a committee continues to evaluate the role of the museum and its collection. In new developments the fate of the Rose grows ever more complicated. As negative reports emerge this story continues to be updated.

Spiro Veloudos has been a fixture on the Boston theatre scene for more than thirty years, and is currently Producing Artistic Director of Lyric Stage. In a revealing conversation, he gives us a behind-the-scenes look at what it takes to run a Boston theatre company.

With the unanimous decision of the Board of Trustees, Jehuda Reinharz, the President of Brandeis University has decided to close the Rose Art Museum and sell its collection appraised at $350 million but worth about half of that estimate in the current art market. It is a desperate measure to stabalize the cash strapped university whose donors have been hit hard by the Bernard Madoff Ponzi scandal.

In 2005, after some 38 years in the small, cramped,studio which he called "The Boston Visionary Cell" Paul Laffoley was evicted. During the move several paintings from the 1960s were discovered. They have been cleaned, restored and shown for the first time since they were created by Kent Gallery in New York.

For some 40 years Cornelius Vermeule was the Curator of Classical Art of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. In addition to being a distinguised scholar he was a renowned wit and merry prankster.

Ned Rorem celebrates his 85th birthday this week. His opera "Our Town"is based on the Thornton Wilder play. It will make its New England premiere on November 14-16 in Peterborough, NH and February 12-16 of 2009 at Tufts University. This chamber opera, according to Musical America, has "emerged as one of those rare new operas that seem destined to survive." Writer Lawrence Johnson catches up with Ned.

Despite the challenges of rainy weather,gas at $4 a gallon, and a bad economy it was a superb season of theatre in the Berkshires. Nicholas Martin was the MVP for putting the venerable Williamstown Theatre Festival back on its feet.

This past weekend James Levine, artistic director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, was given rave reviews for opening the Tanglewood season with a two day concert peformance of the massive and magnificent Berlioz Opera "Les Troyens." It was learned today that Levine will undergo surgery this week. His remaining Tanglewood duties are cancelled but he hopes to be back to cover the opening of the BSO.

A number of leases have expired for galleries on Newbury Street and the South End. This has led to more than the usual turmoil and change in the always difficult Boston art market. While regional dealers struggle there are reports on a boom in the $25 billion international art market.