Freedom of speech includes freedom to not praise the king
This year, in honor of the holiday season, jazz drummer and vibraphonist Chuck Redd canceled his annual Christmas Eve performance at the Kennedy Center.
Redd has helmed the holiday concert for 20 years, but declined to appear this year to protest President Trump’s decision to illegally add his name to the institution without congressional approval. The Kennedy Center now bears the awkward name, “The Donald J. Trump and The John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.”
“When I saw the name change on the Kennedy Center website and then hours later on the building, I chose to cancel our concert,” Redd told the AP.
Trump’s apparatchiks were furious. Kennedy Center spokesperson and regime stooge Roma Daravi fumed, “Any artist cancelling their show at the Trump Kennedy Center over political differences isn’t courageous or principled — they are selfish, intolerant, and have failed to meet the basic duty of a public artist: to perform for all people.”
Kennedy Center officials said they plan to sue Redd for $1 million. Richard Grenell, a longtime Trump sycophant who is now the Kennedy Center president, shared a post about the threatened lawsuit on X and huffed that “we will not let them cancel shows without consequences.”
This is a grotesque effort to bully Redd. It’s also meant to intimidate other artists who might consider boycotts or cancelations.
The episode is the latest in Trump’s ongoing efforts to stifle free expression. But Redd’s refusal to play along is a reminder that there is substantial and ongoing resistance to those efforts, both from artists and from the public. [Continue reading…]
The Kennedy Center is ending the year with a new round of artists saying they are canceling scheduled performances after President Donald Trump’s name was added to the facility, prompting the institution’s president to accuse the performers of making their decisions because of politics.
The Cookers, a jazz supergroup that has performed together for nearly two decades, announced their withdrawal from “A Jazz New Year’s Eve” on their website, saying the “decision has come together very quickly” and acknowledging frustration from those who may have planned to attend.
Doug Varone and Dancers, a dance group based in New York, said in an Instagram post late Monday they would pull out of a performance slated for April, saying they “can no longer permit ourselves nor ask our audiences to step inside this once great institution.” [Continue reading…]