A veteran jazz ensemble and a New York dance company have canceled events at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, intensifying the fallout at one of the nation’s pre-eminent arts centers after it was renamed to include President Trump.
The center had previously promoted two New Year’s Eve performances by the Cookers as an “all-star jazz septet that will ignite the Terrace Theater stage with fire and soul.” But those performances, like an annual Christmas Eve jazz concert hosted by Chuck Redd, are now canceled.
The Cookers did not give a reason for the decision in a statement on Monday that said, “Jazz was born from struggle and from a relentless insistence on freedom: freedom of thought, of expression, and of the full human voice.”
But the band’s drummer, Billy Hart, told The New York Times that the center’s name change had “evidently” played a role. He acknowledged that the group was concerned about possible reprisals.
They didn’t change the name legally. They just changed the name on the building and what everyone in the executive branch and on the board calls it.
So, what’s the distinction? They changed the name, but not through the formal process of signing documents?
I’m having trouble understanding what steps they need to take before I can rightfully be offended, and I don’t know enough about how something like a building or institution is legally or illegally named.
I think that if there is a big sign on a building telling everyone what it’s called, that is what people will call it. I also think it’s safe to assume that not every single Tom, Dick, and Harry in America will have taken the time to be informed of the legal name of a building before using the name stapled to the God damn wall of said fucking building!
If only someone had the balls to write a strongly worded letter to those people and finally put an end to all of these illegal activities.