One section in concert or theater programs that people tend to gloss over is the list of donors. But reading them, if one is really bored with nothing else to peruse, can turn up some surprises. For instance, in past years, if one scanned the donor list for Santa Fe Opera in the season program booklet, one would see these names:
Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Martin D. Ginsburg
Thus
this feature in CNN on Justice Ginsburg and her interest in opera is no surprise. More below the flip....
Mears has one passage about Justice Ginsburg as follows, but note the bit in bold:
"The justice's love of opera is well known. Along with Justice Antonin Scalia, her best friend on the court and fellow operaphile, she has appeared onstage - in costume - for several cameo roles at the Washington Opera."
Scalia is obviously an appalling jerk, as his pronouncements on Obamacare and the health care reform case before SCOTUS indicate. But if every person is allowed one or two small redeeming features, then perhaps his friendship with Ginsburg and appreciation of opera count there, if just barely.
By the way, at the time of Scalia's appointment, one wise reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer said something to the effect of liberals pointing all their venom at the nomination of William Rehnquist as Chief Justice, with respect to Scalia (this quote isn't exact):
"The liberal critics may be focusing their attention on the wrong man."
No kidding.
One other tidbit that I didn't realize about Justice Ginsburg was her son James' connection to the classical music biz. The CNN article mentions:
"Also attending the Friday panel discussion was Ginsburg's son James, a former lawyer who runs Cedille Records, a Chicago-based non-profit classical music label he founded."
Cedille actually is a pretty nice label, with good albums that go a little off the beaten path in its chosen repertoire. In fact, just this year, James Ginsburg was
honored by the Illinois Philharmonic Orchestra:
"This year's recipient of the Ruth D. and Ken M. Davee Excellence in the Arts Award will be James Ginsburg, the founder of Cedille Records and The Chicago Classical Recording Foundation."
In another case of how ideological opposites can occasionally get along, Mears also noted, with respect to Ginsburg and Rehnquist, on how once:
"The late Chief Justice William Rehnquist unexpectedly modified his judicial robes as a subtle tribute to Gilbert and Sullivan's Iolanthe, a fantasy that satirically tweaks the law and government."
Ginsburg recalled:
"'One day, my dear old Chief, who loved Gilbert and Sullivan, appeared in the (court's private) robing room with his new robe, and it had four thin gold stripes. People were aghast,' she recalled, smiling. While many people wondered what the adornment was all about, 'I laughed because I knew exactly what he had done.'"
I remember that there was a
Time picture some years back that showed Rehnquist dressed for G&S, I think in a Washington, D.C. production of
Iolanthe. So while I didn't care for Rehnquist's politics, he did have a modicum of taste outside of politics. In addition, it says something that in the context of Thomas and Alito, I kind of miss Rehnquist.
By the way, more recently, in the list of Santa Fe Opera donors, the one entry now simply reads:
Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Martin D. Ginsburg's name was on the "In Memoriam" page in the 2011 Santa Fe Opera program book, in the "Friends" group.
Some other names through the years on Santa Fe Opera's donor list include:
Professor Murray Gell-Mann
Mr. and Mrs. Tommy Lee Jones
The Honorable Janet Napolitano
Newman's Own Foundation
You can imagine the security measures in place when Napolitano is there. Kind of makes me wonder about the Olympics in London now, with 24 hours left to go for them getting through without any security incidents (fingers crossed).
With that, time for the usual SNLC protocol, as in one's loser stories for the week, although since this is sort of a "joint series" DK diary....well, whatever.