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I could open up the sky to a world unknown
The last time I heard the Lydian String Quartet was in the late winter of 2008, when I loved their rendering of Reza Vali's String Quartet No. 3 (2001) so much that to this day I wish I had a recording of it.
The news that Brandeis has laid off the quartet as part of further cuts to its already endangered music department makes me want to drop-kick my alma mater from a great height.
I never belonged to the Department of Music in the formal sense of a major or a minor. Because I could apparently trilocate in college, I just basically lived at Slosberg in the same way that I never belonged to Comparative Literature and basically lived at Shiffman, while also living at Rabb where I actually belonged to Classical Studies. It was of enormous value to me, incalculable beyond budget cuts, to be able to slide between programs and disciplines which were all living, welcoming, not foolishly marginalized by university administration as expensive, disposable add-ons.
I am in accordance with this student editorial which reiterates once again that enrollment in a liberal arts university is not improved by diminishing the quality and diversity of its arts.
tl;dr: feh.
The news that Brandeis has laid off the quartet as part of further cuts to its already endangered music department makes me want to drop-kick my alma mater from a great height.
I never belonged to the Department of Music in the formal sense of a major or a minor. Because I could apparently trilocate in college, I just basically lived at Slosberg in the same way that I never belonged to Comparative Literature and basically lived at Shiffman, while also living at Rabb where I actually belonged to Classical Studies. It was of enormous value to me, incalculable beyond budget cuts, to be able to slide between programs and disciplines which were all living, welcoming, not foolishly marginalized by university administration as expensive, disposable add-ons.
I am in accordance with this student editorial which reiterates once again that enrollment in a liberal arts university is not improved by diminishing the quality and diversity of its arts.
tl;dr: feh.
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The administration has assessed the value of the quartet at $275,000 a year. I'm sure that much could be saved by firing administrators.
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Nine
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I know the university's financial problems are real (and have been so for years), but the arts should be pried from cold dead fingers, not offered up on a slab.
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I'm hoping for the same kind of outcry as when Jehuda Reinharz tried to sell the Rose Art Museum. One is supposed to be a patron of art, not an extractor of it. (Shipping fortune!)
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Popular opinion is already falling on the university's heads and I hope their administrators responsible get buried under it.
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It's funny you should ask about a President, since Brandeis is just about to lose its incumbent, but it certainly has a Provost and I approve your cost-saving measure.