The British Museum: The Problematic Yet Enduring Appeal of Antiquities

In London last month, my first stop was to visit the British Museum. Going there seemed an urgent priority. My thinking was that in such turbulent contemporary times, it is reassuring to see the classics of antiquity, those fundaments of Western Civilization that remain. At the same time, given our shifting ethical rationales concerning antiquities, […]

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Using the Blues to Bridge Across the Great Americana Divide

One of the things I most enjoy about benefit concerts (beyond the whole save-the-world ethos), and music award shows (beyond the awards themselves) is seeing a wide spectrum of artists, each doing 3-5 songs. It’s sort the musical equivalent of a smorgasbord – enough to hear a favorite artist or song and discover someone worth […]

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Luciana Souza’s New Recording, “The Book of Longing” Translates Poetry into Jazz

https://www.forbes.com/sites/tomteicholz/2018/11/23/luciana-souzas-new-recording-the-book-of-longing-translates-poetry-into-jazz/#30ef91717901 On her new recording, “The Book of Longing,” Luciana Souza marries poetry and Jazz in an idiom all her own with spare accompaniment and her uniquely atmospheric vocals to haunting effect. Souza will be performing her lyrical new songs along with some of her more Brazilian-inflected tunes at UCLA’s Royce Hall on December 1 […]

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Using the Blues to Bridge Across the Great Americana Divide

One of the things I most enjoy about benefit concerts (beyond the whole save-the-world ethos), and music award shows (beyond the awards themselves) is seeing a wide spectrum of artists, each doing 3-5 songs. It’s sort the musical equivalent of a smorgasbord – enough to hear a favorite artist or song and discover someone worth […]

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The Getty Museum’s Freakin’ Amazing Ancient Hebrew Manuscript

“Freakin” Amazing!”Those are words I never expected to hear from Rabbi Steven Leder, the senior Rabbi at Wilshire Boulevard Temple in Los Angeles (the congregation to which I belong).Rabbi Leder was marveling at the Getty Museum’s latest acquisition, The 13th Century Rothschild Pentateuch (which is also the first Hebrew manuscript in the Getty’s collection). View […]

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See Alison Saar’s ‘Topsy Turvy’ Art

Alison Saar’s new paintings and sculptures at LA Louver in Venice, CA, (on view through May 12, 2018) speak of a strength derived from a bitter harvest.The exhibition is called “Topsy Turvy,” and the figures reference Topsy, a character in Harriett Beecher Stowe’s great abolitionist novel, “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.”Topsy, as described by Stowe, had wooly […]

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Buzzed About Art Fair in Santa Monica Shines Light on Cheech Marin’s Collection

This week’s Art Los Angeles Contemporary Art fair in Santa Monica, (Jan..25-28 at Barker Hanger) is no joke. And neither is Cheech Marin’s collection of Chicano Art.Art Los Angeles Contemporary (ALAC) launches this Thursday, January 25 and runs through Sunday January 28 at Barker Hanger in Santa Monica. This is the ninth year of ALAC […]

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Steve Leder Knows Things (More Beautiful than Before: How Suffering Transforms Us)

Steve Leder knows things. As the senior Rabbi at Wilshire Boulevard Temple, the 155-year-old Los Angeles congregation that is home to some 2400 families (including mine), where Leder has served for 30 years, when his phone rings, it is often not good news. He has had to comfort, support, minister to and officiate at hundreds […]

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