8.07.2005
change is...?
Change comes in many different ways: sometimes change emerges out of adaptation to a particular problem: think all of those security patches in Windows or Macintosh operating systems. Sometimes it emerges out off brand new technology, like the demise of Polaroid corporation (hastened, I'm sure, by its inexplicable decision to, in essence, delete its digital imaging division). And sometimes change emerges simply out of having nothing better to do but tinker.
Our case in point is a little ice cream shop in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, profiled this week in the food section of the Washington Post. This is a guy whose passion for ice cream and probably for freaking people out has now found its calling in inventing some of the weirder flavors seen in ice cream. Barbeque? Bacon? Mushroom-Pumpkin? There's a place near Boston that does things like wasabi and other spices.
Tanglewood is changing too. I came out here two weeks ago for a Sunday afternoon concert, which was bright and sunny (a bit too sunny, frankly) and quite good. Unfortunately, the giant tree in the middle of the lawn got really sick during the winter and was pruned down to its bare essentials, which makes it appear gaunt and thin. But the real shocker was last night, when I saw and evening concert for the first time this year. They've permanently installed video screens for the lawn patrons (the video screens are there for Sunday afternoons, but the light outside makes them impossible to see). The video screens were first used a couple of years ago for a John Williams film night. Then they were used for the Boston Pops, the Popular Artists Series, and then the larger, more visually tantalizing programs (the flamenco dancer in De Falla's La Vida Breve two years ago comes to mind). For the first time this year, they're being used permanently: it reduces the Tanglewood experience to that of watching a televised broadcast. Already the speaker system used on the lawn delivers music that is only marginally better than listening to a decent radio. Now it's accompanied by video? Not only this, but Tanglewood uses the video screens for its own advertisements before the concert and during intermission.
Our case in point is a little ice cream shop in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, profiled this week in the food section of the Washington Post. This is a guy whose passion for ice cream and probably for freaking people out has now found its calling in inventing some of the weirder flavors seen in ice cream. Barbeque? Bacon? Mushroom-Pumpkin? There's a place near Boston that does things like wasabi and other spices.
Tanglewood is changing too. I came out here two weeks ago for a Sunday afternoon concert, which was bright and sunny (a bit too sunny, frankly) and quite good. Unfortunately, the giant tree in the middle of the lawn got really sick during the winter and was pruned down to its bare essentials, which makes it appear gaunt and thin. But the real shocker was last night, when I saw and evening concert for the first time this year. They've permanently installed video screens for the lawn patrons (the video screens are there for Sunday afternoons, but the light outside makes them impossible to see). The video screens were first used a couple of years ago for a John Williams film night. Then they were used for the Boston Pops, the Popular Artists Series, and then the larger, more visually tantalizing programs (the flamenco dancer in De Falla's La Vida Breve two years ago comes to mind). For the first time this year, they're being used permanently: it reduces the Tanglewood experience to that of watching a televised broadcast. Already the speaker system used on the lawn delivers music that is only marginally better than listening to a decent radio. Now it's accompanied by video? Not only this, but Tanglewood uses the video screens for its own advertisements before the concert and during intermission.
