(Or Ages Dark & Light) – By John Howe

New books are always a welcome event, especially as they provide an excuse to briefly escape from the studio and get out into the rest of the world a moment. (Like many illustrators, the time spent proportionately in the former as opposed to the latter is sadly inferior in quantity; quality, of course, not being issue open to debate or even wise to contemplate.)

And, yet another chance to set thoughts to paper. A portion of this is my personal ramblings for the book itself, but has been considerably restructured and augmented thanks to the kind prodding (ignore illustrator’s hesitations, uncertainty, unsureness, doubt, irresolution, indecision, equivocation, vacillation, waffling, wavering, second thoughts, dithering, stalling, dawdling, temporization, delay, reluctance, disinclination, unease, and dubiety too) and pertinent questions (“Can you repeat that? Intelligibly. Please?”) of Ruth Prickett at Illustration Magazine. See their FALL 2007 issue. Buy a copy. Subscribe. (Buy a back copy – there is a lovely article in the Spring 2007 issue which should be in the libraries of all self-respecting admirers of Mervyn Peake.) [More]

It may be a long way back to recapture audiences lost to classical music through the disappearance of music education from the schools, changing lifestyles and perceptions of elitism, but the way back may be through places like Middle-earth. The average age at Saturday night’s performance of Howard Shore’s “Lord of the Rings Symphony” by the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra at Music Hall appeared much younger than the normal mid-50s demographic. CSO staffers scrambled to handle the walk-up traffic just minutes before the concert, and it seemed that only the unsellable seats in the 3,516-seat hall (several hundred are limited and obstructed views) remained empty.

‘Lord of the Rings Symphony’ attracts younger audience